AI note taker apps: Otter, Fireflies, Fathom, and Granola

November 10, 2026 · 5 min read · Updated November 11, 2026

AI note taker apps such as Otter, Fireflies, Fathom, and Granola work across Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams, either by sending a bot into the meeting or by capturing sound on your computer. As of November 11, 2026, all four have a free plan with different limits, publish their prices in US dollars only, and make you responsible for getting participants’ consent.

Choosing an AI note taker app

A note taker app follows you from one platform to another, which matters if clients invite you to Zoom one day and Teams the next. This page is part of meeting transcription tools and compares four apps from their own help pages, pricing pages, and terms as of November 11, 2026. We have not tested them, and we found no independent study of their accuracy.

The first choice is not the brand but the method. Otter, Fireflies, and Fathom send a bot that joins the call as a visible participant; Granola, and the desktop apps of the other three, capture the sound on your computer instead. Then check one setting before you connect your calendar: whether the app joins meetings on its own.

The four apps side by side

	Otter	Fireflies	Fathom	Granola
How it listens	Bot, or desktop app without bot	Bot, or desktop app and Meet extension	Bot; bot-free on Mac, rolling out	Desktop app, no bot
Free plan	300 minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation, last 25 conversations	3 meetings, or unlimited with auto-join on; 400 minutes of storage	Unlimited recordings; advanced summaries for 5 calls a month	Notes from the last 30 days
First paid plan, billed monthly	Pro, $16.99	Pro, $18	Premium, $20	Business, $14
Same plan, billed annually	$8.33 a month	$10 a month	$16 a month	Monthly only
Joins meetings by itself	All meetings with a video link, in a workspace; individual default not stated	All meetings, by default	Default not stated	No, you start each note
Training on your data	Its own AI, on de-identified audio and transcripts	Not for generative AI; usage data derived	De-identified data, with an opt-out	Anonymized data by default, with an opt-out

All prices are per user per month, in US dollars, the only currency these four companies display. Fireflies’ free limit applies to accounts created since September 1, 2026.

Bot or no bot

A bot is easy to spot. It joins under a name such as “[Your name]’s Notetaker (Otter.ai),” “Fireflies.ai Notetaker,” or “[Name]’s Fathom Notetaker,” and often posts a message in the chat. Otter’s and Fireflies’ bots can attend a meeting you skip; Fathom’s records only while you are there.

Without a bot, the meeting platform shows nothing to the other participants, so telling them falls to you. Fireflies’ desktop app turns on a badge, a spoken notice, and a chat message by default the first time you use it. Granola offers an automatic chat message and a video watermark, which you switch on yourself on its Free and Business plans. Granola says it does not record or save audio at any point, and starts only when you click into a note.

Check auto-join before you connect your calendar

Fireflies’ help center says it is set to all meetings by default. That creates a trade-off on its free plan: turn auto-join off, and new accounts get three meetings; leave it on, and the bot may join calls where it is not welcome. The settings to look for:

Fireflies: under Auto-join calendar meetings, choose “Only when I invite.” To remove the bot mid-call, take it off the participant list or type /ff leave; if it leaves within three minutes, no transcript is created.
Otter: under Meetings, then AI Notetaker settings, choose “Meetings I manually select.” Meetings you already switched on or off by hand keep their setting.
Fathom: in your recording settings, choose all, external, internal, or no meetings.
Granola: nothing to change; it never starts by itself.

What happens to your recordings

The four companies give four different answers on training, and these are their claims, not test results:

Otter’s privacy policy, in force since June 16, 2026, says it trains its own AI on de-identified audio recordings and on transcriptions, which may contain personal information. A separate setting, “Help improve Otter,” gives wider access, including human review, only if you allow it.
Fireflies’ terms say it will not use your content to train or fine-tune generative AI models, though it may derive usage and statistical data from it.
Fathom uses de-identified data for its own models depending on your settings and lets you opt out; it does not say what the default is. Superhuman announced on September 14, 2026 that it had acquired Fathom.
Granola uses anonymized data by default on Free and Business; the switch is in Settings, then Preferences, under “Use my data to improve models for everyone.” Enterprise workspaces are opted out by default, and Granola cannot guarantee that data was not used before you changed the setting.

For readers outside the US, hosting matters: Otter, Fathom, and Granola say they host in the US, and Granola states that it offers no EU, UK, or other regional data residency.

Each company’s terms put consent on you. Otter says you are solely responsible for notices and consent; Fireflies, that you must ensure each participant consents; Fathom forbids using its service if any participant does not consent; Granola, that you must obtain the consent recording laws require. Fireflies even warns that a bot in the participant list may not meet consent laws, and Otter’s help center suggests applying all-party consent practices everywhere.

Who must agree depends on where each participant is. See recording consent rules by country and state.

Meetings without a screen

Three of the four apps also have phone apps for meetings around a table. See AI notes for in-person meetings, including recorder devices.

If you already pay for Microsoft 365 or Workspace

Teams, Google Meet, and Zoom include their own note takers on some plans. See the AI notes built into each platform before you add an app.