Most guides to AI note taking compare ten apps as though they do the same job. They do not. Roughly half of the tools in this category are meeting assistants that join or listen to a call and produce a transcript, and the other half are knowledge apps that help you write, organise and search notes you create yourself. Buying one when you needed the other is the most common mistake in this category.
This guide separates the two groups, then compares the seven strongest options on the things that decide the choice: what the free tier actually allows, which meeting platforms are supported, how recording works, and what happens to your data. Figures come from vendor pricing pages and official documentation, and where a vendor does not publish a number, this guide says so instead of estimating.
Two different products, sold as one category
AI meeting assistants capture live conversations. Their value is transcription accuracy, summaries and action items, and their limits are measured in minutes, storage or AI credits. Otter, Fireflies, Fathom and Granola belong here.
AI note and knowledge apps work on notes you write. Their value is organisation, retrieval and writing assistance across a growing library, and their limits are measured in notes, storage or seats. Notion, Evernote and Mem belong here.
There is some overlap. Notion now includes AI meeting notes, and several meeting tools store transcripts in a searchable library. But the core job is different, and so is the way each one bills you.
AI meeting assistants
1. Otter.ai — strict minute caps, familiar interface
Otter is the best-known name here and the most restrictive on its free plan. Basic gives 300 transcription minutes per month with a 30-minute cap on any single conversation, which means a standard one-hour meeting is cut off halfway. It also allows only three audio or video file imports for the lifetime of the account, not per month. Unused minutes do not roll over.
Pro is listed at $16.99 per user per month on monthly billing, or $8.33 per user per month billed annually, and raises the allowance to 1,200 minutes with a limited number of file imports. Business is $30 per user per month monthly, or about $19.99 billed annually, and removes the meeting cap. Enterprise is custom priced and adds SSO and compliance features. Several sources note a minimum seat count on the Business tier, so confirm that with Otter if your team is small.
Otter uses a bot that joins the call as a visible participant, and supports Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams.
Suited to: individuals who need occasional transcription and want a mature, widely supported tool, provided the minute caps fit their meeting load.
2. Fireflies.ai — unlimited transcription, limited storage
Fireflies inverts Otter’s model. Every plan, including the free one, includes unlimited transcription and unlimited AI summaries. The constraint is storage: the free plan holds 400 minutes of recordings across the whole team, not per person, and the free tier also restricts transcript downloads and integrations.
Pro is $10 per seat per month billed annually, or $18 monthly, and raises storage substantially per seat. Business is $19 per seat annually, or $29 monthly, and adds CRM sync and conversation intelligence. Enterprise is $39 per seat on annual billing only and adds HIPAA compliance and SSO.
The detail that catches people out is AI credits. Features such as AskFred and the AI apps consume credits from a monthly allowance rather than running unlimited, so heavy use of the AI extras can stop mid-month even on a paid plan. Fireflies documents that credit consumption varies by request complexity rather than being a flat rate per action.
Suited to: teams that record constantly and need every call transcribed, and that can live within a storage allowance rather than a minute allowance.
3. Fathom — the most generous free recording, capped AI
Fathom’s free plan includes unlimited recording, unlimited transcription and unlimited storage across Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams, with no time limit and no card required. The cap sits on the AI rather than the recording: advanced AI summaries and action items are limited to five calls per month, after which you get a basic template.
Premium is $20 per month, or $16 per month billed annually, and removes the AI cap for an individual. Team is $19 per user per month, or $15 annually, with a two-seat minimum. Business is $34 per user per month, or $25 annually, and adds CRM field sync for Salesforce and HubSpot. Fathom also offers a 90-day money-back guarantee on paid plans, which is unusually long for this category.
Fathom joins calls as a visible participant named as a notetaker, so everyone in the meeting can see that recording is happening.
Suited to: individuals who want a genuinely usable free tier for recording, and sales teams that need CRM sync on the Business plan.
4. Granola — no bot joins the call
Granola works differently from the other three. Rather than sending a bot into the meeting, it captures audio directly from your device, so nothing visibly joins the call. Granola states that it stores transcripts rather than audio recordings, which is a meaningful difference if retention is a concern, and also means you cannot replay a call to check a transcription error.
The free Basic plan includes unlimited meetings, AI notes, AI chat, custom templates and multi-language support. Its limitation is meeting history: Granola’s pricing page describes the free tier as having limited history without publishing a specific window, and third-party reports of the exact number disagree, so treat any figure you read elsewhere with caution and check inside the app. Older notes are stored rather than deleted, but become inaccessible until you upgrade.
Business is $14 per user per month and unlocks unlimited history plus integrations including Notion, HubSpot, Slack and Zapier. Enterprise is $35 per user per month and adds SSO, API access and organisation-wide controls. Granola bills monthly and does not currently offer an annual discount, which is unusual here.
Two practical constraints. Granola requires a desktop or mobile app rather than a browser, and runs on Mac, Windows and iOS. On training, Granola states that users can opt out of AI model training in settings on any plan including the free one, but only the Enterprise tier lets an administrator enforce that across a team.
Suited to: consultants, executives and anyone in external meetings where a visible recording bot would be awkward, provided a desktop app is acceptable.
AI note and knowledge apps
5. Notion — AI is now a plan tier, not an add-on
The most important thing to know about Notion in 2026 is that its AI pricing changed. Notion AI used to be a per-seat add-on you could attach to any plan. That add-on was retired for new customers, and the full AI feature set now ships with the Business plan. If you read a guide quoting a flat monthly AI surcharge on top of Free or Plus, it is out of date.
Current tiers are Free at $0, Plus at $10 per user per month billed annually or $12 monthly, Business at $20 per user per month annually or $24 monthly, and Enterprise at custom pricing. Business is the entry point for the full AI set, which includes AI meeting notes, workspace-wide search and agents. Free and Plus include only limited AI.
There is a second meter to watch: Notion’s custom agents run on credits, sold at $10 per 1,000 credits, purchased separately by workspace admins. Credits are pooled across the workspace, reset each cycle and do not roll over, and agents pause when the pool is empty. Notion does not publish a fixed per-action rate, so credit consumption is difficult to forecast precisely.
Suited to: teams that want notes, documents, databases and meeting notes in one workspace, and that are already paying for Business or willing to move to it.
6. Evernote — mature capture, a free tier that is really a trial
Evernote remains strong at what it has always been good at: capturing anything, and searching text inside images and scanned PDFs. Its AI features add semantic search, transcription and editing assistance on paid tiers.
The free plan is the thing to understand before signing up. It is capped at 50 notes in total, one notebook, and syncing on a single device. That is a lifetime cap on the account rather than a monthly allowance, which makes it an extended trial rather than a permanent free tier.
Evernote also restructured its paid lineup, retiring the former Personal and Professional plans and replacing them with Starter and Advanced tiers, with an Enterprise option above. Published figures for those tiers differ noticeably between sources and between monthly and annual billing, so check Evernote’s own pricing page for the current numbers rather than relying on a secondary quote.
Suited to: people with years of existing Evernote content, and anyone whose work depends on searching scanned documents and handwriting.
7. Mem — organisation without folders or tags
Mem takes the opposite approach to Notion’s structured workspace. Instead of asking you to file notes into folders and tags, it uses AI to link related notes automatically and surface them when relevant, with a chat interface for querying your own knowledge base. Mem released a major version in 2026 focused on speed and reliability.
Mem offers a free tier and a paid individual plan, with team pricing available. Published third-party figures for the paid plan vary widely, and this guide will not pick one of them: check Mem’s own pricing page for the current rate before subscribing. One naming caution worth knowing is that Mem, the note-taking app, is a separate company from a similarly named developer memory API, and search results frequently mix the two.
Suited to: individual knowledge workers and researchers who accumulate a lot of notes and dislike maintaining a filing system.
Free tiers and platform support compared
Free tiers are where these tools differ most, and the limit is rarely the one you expect. Figures below are as published by each vendor at the time of writing.
| Tool | Type | What the free tier limits | Recording method | Platforms |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Otter.ai | Meeting | 300 min/month, 30 min per conversation, 3 lifetime imports | Bot joins call | Zoom, Google Meet, Teams |
| Fireflies.ai | Meeting | Unlimited transcription; 400 min storage per team; limited AI credits | Bot joins call | Zoom, Google Meet, Teams and others |
| Fathom | Meeting | Unlimited recording; advanced AI summaries capped at 5 calls/month | Bot joins call | Zoom, Google Meet, Teams |
| Granola | Meeting | Unlimited meetings; limited history, window not published | Captures device audio, no bot | Mac, Windows, iOS desktop/mobile app |
| Notion | Notes | Free and Plus include limited AI only; full AI requires Business | AI meeting notes on Business | Web, desktop, mobile |
| Evernote | Notes | 50 notes total, 1 notebook, 1 synced device | Not a meeting recorder | Web, desktop, mobile |
| Mem | Notes | Free tier available; paid rate not consistently published by third parties | Not a meeting recorder | Web, desktop, mobile |
Recording, consent and privacy
This section is general information, not legal advice. Recording rules vary by country and, in the United States, by state, and the right answer for your situation depends on where you and the other participants are. If anything here matters to your work, take proper advice.
The practical point is that these tools differ in how visible recording is. Otter, Fireflies and Fathom send a bot that appears in the participant list, so everyone on the call can see that a recording is running. Granola captures audio from your device, which means nothing announces itself to the other participants. That difference is a convenience feature and a responsibility at the same time: if the tool does not tell people, you have to.
Some jurisdictions require only one party to a conversation to consent to recording. Others require every participant to consent. Recording someone without the consent your jurisdiction requires can carry legal consequences, and rules can differ again when participants are in different places, which is common on remote calls. Many organisations also have their own policies on recording customer or candidate conversations, independent of the law.
Regardless of jurisdiction, a few habits are worth adopting:
- Say at the start of the call that you are recording and why, and note it in the invitation where you can.
- Check your employer’s policy before recording external calls, particularly with customers, candidates or patients.
- Check what each vendor does with your data. Granola, for example, states that it stores transcripts rather than audio and lets users opt out of AI model training in settings, though only its Enterprise tier lets an administrator enforce that for a whole team.
- If you work in a regulated field, confirm the compliance features you need are on the plan you are buying. HIPAA support, SSO and data-retention controls generally sit on the top tiers.
- Ask before recording conversations that touch health, legal or HR matters, and consider whether an AI transcript should exist at all.
How to choose
Start by deciding which of the two jobs you have. If you want a record of conversations, you need a meeting assistant. If you want help organising what you write, you need a knowledge app. Buying the wrong category is more expensive than picking the wrong tool within it.
If you are in back-to-back meetings, Otter’s free minute cap will run out in days. Fathom’s unlimited free recording or Fireflies’ unlimited free transcription will go further, though each caps something else.
If a visible bot is a problem in client or executive settings, Granola is the option here that does not add a participant, with the responsibility that shifts onto you.
If your notes already live in a workspace, Notion’s bundled AI may be cheaper than adding a separate tool, provided you are on or moving to Business.
If you rely on searching scanned documents, Evernote still does that better than most, but plan on paying, because the free tier will not hold a real note library.
Every tool here has a free tier or a trial. Run one for a fortnight against your actual meetings before committing, because transcription quality varies far more with your audio setup and accents than with the marketing copy.
Related guides
- Best AI Meeting Assistants in 2026
- Best AI Productivity Tools in 2026
- Best AI Writing Tools in 2026
- Best AI Research Tools in 2026
- Best AI Email Assistants in 2026
Frequently asked questions
Which of these has the most usable free plan?
It depends what you need unlimited. Fathom gives unlimited free recording and transcription but caps advanced AI summaries at five calls a month. Fireflies gives unlimited free transcription but only 400 minutes of storage for the entire team. Otter caps minutes outright at 300 a month. Granola gives unlimited meetings but limits how far back you can open notes.
Can I use one of these without a bot joining the meeting?
Granola captures audio from your own device rather than sending a participant into the call. The others in this guide join as a visible participant. If nothing announces the recording, telling the other participants becomes your responsibility.
Do unused transcription minutes carry over?
Generally no. Otter documents that minutes reset each cycle and do not roll over, and Notion’s AI credits reset each billing cycle without carrying forward. Assume no rollover unless a vendor explicitly says otherwise.
Is Notion AI still available as an add-on?
Not for new customers. The standalone add-on was retired and the full AI set now ships with the Business plan, so the practical cost of Notion AI is the cost of that plan rather than a separate line item.
Which is better for students?
For students recording lectures, a meeting assistant with a generous free recording allowance is the better fit. For organising coursework and revision notes, a knowledge app suits better. Several vendors offer education discounts, so check with your institutional email before paying full price.
Conclusion
The most useful thing to take from this comparison is that these seven tools are not interchangeable. Otter, Fireflies, Fathom and Granola compete on capturing conversations, and their free tiers each restrict a different thing, so the right one depends on whether your constraint is minutes, storage, AI summaries or note history. Notion, Evernote and Mem compete on what happens to notes you write yourself, and differ mainly in how much structure they expect from you.
Whichever you choose, check two things the marketing pages tend not to lead with: exactly what the free tier limits, and what the vendor does with your recordings. For a closer look at the meeting-focused end of this category, see our guide to the best AI meeting assistants in 2026.
