# Otter.ai Alternatives 2027: 10 Paid, Free & Open-Source

Source: https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/otter-ai/
Prices checked: 2026-11-11 (Zekai Price Ledger)

The best Otter.ai alternatives in 2027 are Fireflies.ai (best overall, $10/seat/mo billed yearly), Fathom (best free plan: Unlimited recordings and transcripts) and Meetily (best open source, MIT). Otter.ai itself starts at $8.33/user/mo billed yearly. Zekai checked these prices on vendor pages on 11 Nov 2026; 7 more are compared below, including 4 with a free plan and 2 open source.

| Tool | Type | Starting price | Free plan limit | Licence | Best for | Price checked | Links |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Otter.ai (the tool being replaced) | — | $8.33/user/mo billed yearly | 300 minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation | — | — | 2026-11-11 | [pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing) |
| Fireflies.ai | Free plan + paid | $10/seat/mo billed yearly | 400 mins of storage per team, 20 AI credits | — | Teams wanting a free tier with no minute cap | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://fireflies.ai) [pricing](https://fireflies.ai/pricing) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/fireflies/) |
| Fathom | Free plan + paid | $16/user/mo billed yearly | Unlimited recordings and transcriptions | — | Individuals wanting free unlimited call recording | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://fathom.ai) [pricing](https://www.fathom.ai/pricing) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/fathom/) |
| Granola | Free plan + paid | $14/user/mo | Limited meeting history, 30 days | — | Individuals wanting pre-meeting briefs | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://www.granola.ai) [pricing](https://www.granola.ai/pricing) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/granola-ai/) |
| Read AI | Free plan + paid | $15/user/mo billed yearly | 5 meeting transcripts per month, 1 hour max | — | Light users wanting meeting reports and metrics | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://www.read.ai) [pricing](https://www.read.ai/pricing) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/read-ai/) |
| Avoma | Paid | $19/seat/mo billed yearly | No free plan | — | Sales teams needing conversation intelligence | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://www.avoma.com) [pricing](https://www.avoma.com/pricing) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/avoma/) |
| MeetGeek | Free | Free plan; paid price not published | 3 hours of transcription a month | — | Free users wanting stated retention periods | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://meetgeek.ai) [pricing](https://meetgeek.ai/pricing) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/meetgeek/) |
| tl;dv | Free | Free plan; paid price not published |  | — | Users wanting a free start and annual discounts | 2026-11-11 | [site](https://tldv.io) [pricing](https://tldv.io/app/pricing/) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/tldv/) |
| Meetily | Open source | Free (self-hosted) | No limit (self-hosted) | MIT | Local-first meeting notes without subscriptions |  | [site](https://meetily.ai) [code](https://github.com/Zackriya-Solutions/meetily) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/meetily/) |
| Vexa | Open source | Free (self-hosted) | No limit (self-hosted) | Apache-2.0 | Developers building transcription into products |  | [site](https://vexa.ai) [code](https://github.com/Vexa-ai/vexa) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/vexa/) |
| Muesli | Open source | Free (self-hosted) | No limit (self-hosted) | MIT | Mac users wanting on-device transcription |  | [site](https://muesli.works) [code](https://github.com/Muesli-HQ/muesli) [Zekai page](https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/muesli/) |

## How each alternative compares with Otter.ai

- **Fireflies.ai** (Free plan + paid, $10/seat/mo billed yearly, checked 2026-11-11): Free plan lists unlimited transcription with 400 minutes of storage per team and 20 AI credits, while Otter Basic caps recording at 300 minutes a month per user. Switch if you want a free tier without a monthly transcription-minute cap and per-seat annual pricing. Stay with Otter.ai if you rely on Pro's 1,200 monthly minutes and 90-minute conversations with an Otter workspace.
- **Fathom** (Free plan + paid, $16/user/mo billed yearly, checked 2026-11-11): Vendor lists unlimited recordings and transcriptions on the free plan, while Otter Basic stops at 300 monthly minutes and 3 lifetime file imports; Premium is $16 per user billed yearly. Switch if you mostly record live calls and want free recording and transcription without a monthly minute allowance. Stay with Otter.ai if you need to import audio or video files beyond three, which Otter Pro raises to ten monthly.
- **Granola** (Free plan + paid, $14/user/mo, checked 2026-11-11): Basic is free with a 30-day meeting history; Business at $14 per user monthly adds pre-meeting briefs, follow-up emails and integrations that Basic excludes. Switch if you want pre-meeting briefs and follow-up emails and accept a $14 per user monthly plan. Stay with Otter.ai if you need a workspace of up to 25 members with unlimited meeting minutes, as on Otter Business.
- **Read AI** (Free plan + paid, $15/user/mo billed yearly, checked 2026-11-11): Free plan allows 5 meeting transcripts and 5 reports a month, a one-hour meeting maximum, and no audio or video uploads; Pro is $15 per user billed annually. Switch if you want per-meeting reports and live notes metrics and can live with five free meetings monthly. Stay with Otter.ai if you import recordings, since Read AI's free plan excludes uploads while Otter Basic allows three lifetime imports.
- **Avoma** (Paid, $19/seat/mo billed yearly, checked 2026-11-11): No permanent free plan: a 14-day Organization trial, then Startup at $19 per recorder seat billed yearly, with viewers always free and revenue add-ons at $29 each. Switch if your team sells and wants conversation and revenue intelligence add-ons with free view-only seats. Stay with Otter.ai if you want a permanent free tier, which Otter provides with 300 monthly minutes.
- **MeetGeek** (Free, Free plan; paid price not published): Free Basic gives 3 hours of transcription a month with 3 months of transcript storage and 1 month of audio storage, plus a 2-hour per-meeting recording limit. Switch if you want a free plan that states transcript and audio retention periods up front. Stay with Otter.ai if you want 300 free monthly minutes and the 25 most recent conversations kept in history.
- **tl;dv** (Free, Free plan; paid price not published): The pricing page title says start free and its description advertises 40% off every annual plan; plan limits did not load today, so none are stated here. Switch if you prefer a free start and annual-plan discounts and will confirm the limits on its own page. Stay with Otter.ai if you want Otter's published Pro caps of 1,200 monthly minutes and 90-minute conversations.
- **Meetily** (Open source, Free (self-hosted)): Local-first app that transcribes meetings on your own machine and writes summaries with no per-user subscription; installers exist for Windows and macOS, Linux builds from source. Switch if you want recordings and transcripts kept on your own computer rather than in a cloud workspace. Stay with Otter.ai if you need shared team workspaces and hosted storage without maintaining any software yourself.
- **Vexa** (Open source, Free (self-hosted)): Self-hostable meeting bots join calls and stream real-time transcripts through an API with MCP support, aimed at building into your own product rather than using an app. Switch if you need to build meeting transcription into your own product through an API instead of using an app. Stay with Otter.ai if you want a finished notetaker app rather than infrastructure to deploy and maintain.
- **Muesli** (Open source, Free (self-hosted)): macOS app capturing microphone and system audio with on-device speech recognition and pyannote-based speaker labels; requires Apple Silicon and macOS 14.2 or later. Switch if you work on an Apple Silicon Mac and want fully on-device transcription with speaker labels. Stay with Otter.ai if you use Windows or Linux, or need a web workspace across devices.

## Open-source options in detail

- **Meetily** (https://github.com/Zackriya-Solutions/meetily): Licence: MIT
- **Vexa** (https://github.com/Vexa-ai/vexa): Licence: Apache-2.0
- **Muesli** (https://github.com/Muesli-HQ/muesli): Licence: MIT

## Questions

### What is the best alternative to Otter.ai in 2027?
Fireflies.ai is the best overall Otter.ai alternative on this page ($10/seat/mo billed yearly). For no cost, Fathom has a free plan (Unlimited recordings and transcriptions). To self-host, Meetily is open source (MIT).

### Is there a free version of Otter.ai?
Yes. Otter.ai has a free plan: 300 minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation. Paid plans start at $8.33/user/mo billed yearly, checked on 11 Nov 2026.

### Is there a 100% free alternative to Otter.ai?
Yes. Meetily, Vexa, Muesli are open source and free to self-host. Fireflies.ai, Fathom, Granola, Read AI, MeetGeek, tl;dv have a free plan with limits, shown in the table.

### What is cheaper than Otter.ai?
Granola starts at $14/user/mo, against $8.33/user/mo billed yearly for Otter.ai, as listed on each vendor's pricing page on 11 Nov 2026.

### How much do Otter.ai alternatives cost for a team of 5?
If each of 5 people buys the entry paid plan, at the prices Zekai checked on 11 Nov 2026, the monthly cost is Fireflies.ai $50/mo, Granola $70/mo, Read AI $75/mo, against Otter.ai $41.65/mo for Otter.ai. Team and business plans can cost more per seat. The Zekai Cost Finder on this page recalculates for any team size.

### Which is better, Fireflies.ai or Otter.ai?
Free plan lists unlimited transcription with 400 minutes of storage per team and 20 AI credits, while Otter Basic caps recording at 300 minutes a month per user. Choose Fireflies.ai if you want a free tier without a monthly transcription-minute cap and per-seat annual pricing. Stay with Otter.ai if you rely on Pro's 1,200 monthly minutes and 90-minute conversations with an Otter workspace.

### Why are people leaving Otter.ai?
The documented reasons are: Otter's free Basic plan limits transcription to 300 minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation and 3 lifetime file imports (11 Nov 2026); Pro caps conversations at 90 minutes and imports at 10 files a month, with unlimited recording minutes only on Business and Enterprise (11 Nov 2026). Each is sourced in the section above.

### What is better than Otter.ai?
It depends on the job. Fathom suits free call recording, Fireflies.ai suits teams, and Avoma suits sales conversations. Each has a different limit than Otter.

## Related on Zekai

- [Fathom alternatives](https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/fathom/)
- [Granola alternatives](https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/granola-ai/)
- [Read AI alternatives](https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/read-ai/)
- [tl;dv alternatives](https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/tldv/)
- [Fireflies.ai alternatives](https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/fireflies-ai/)
- [Krisp alternatives](https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/krisp/)
- [AI for Personal Productivity & Executive Assistants](https://zekaiwork.com/professions/ai-personal-productivity-executive-assistants/)

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Live table, team cost finder and price alerts: https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/otter-ai/