Avoma vs Read.ai – Feature and product comparison

Here's what you should look for in an AI meeting automation tool:

• Transcripts that create a word-for-word record of the meeting. For example, a one-hour product development meeting generates a searchable document containing every feature discussion, technical requirement, and team decision.

• Action items are pulled directly from the conversation. When someone says "John will update the wireframes by Friday," the AI automatically creates a tracked task with the assignee and deadline.

• Meeting summaries distill hour-long conversations into 2-3 paragraphs. A 45-minute sprint planning meeting becomes a concise overview of sprint goals, resource allocation, and key decisions.

• Topic segmentation breaks discussions into labeled sections. A client call covering multiple projects is automatically divided into sections like "Website Redesign," "Q1 Marketing Campaign," and "Budget Review."

Other key features

In addition to the quality of these deliverables, we'll want to look at a number of other key factors:

• Ease-of-use: does it have a simple, intuitive setup that works for non-technical users?

• In-person meeting support: can it transcribe audio from live recordings or uploaded files, not just virtual calls?

• Security and privacy: how is customer data handled on the platform?

• Integrations: can it connect with your existing stack, like HubSpot, Notion, or Slack?

• Functionality: does it go beyond transcriptions and actually help you take action?

• Languages: can it transcribe and summarize meetings in different languages?

• Desktop and mobile apps: can you access it on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android for on-the-go meetings?

Understanding Avoma and Read.ai

Avoma is an AI meeting assistant that records, transcribes, and summarizes conversations. It generates structured notes with identified topics and action items while supporting agenda templates, live collaboration, and CRM synchronization. Though primarily used by sales and customer success teams for automated call logging, it serves general meeting productivity needs with approximately 95% transcription accuracy even with technical jargon or accents.

The platform operates on a tiered pricing model starting with a free plan limited to about 10 meetings monthly, with paid plans ranging from $19 to $129 per user monthly. Avoma integrates with various tools including Zoom, HubSpot, and Slack, and works for both online and in-person meetings through mobile apps. While offering good transcription quality and responsive support, some users find it overly complex for basic needs, occasionally experience technical delays, and consider higher-tier pricing expensive for smaller teams.

Read.ai is an AI meeting "copilot" that transcribes meetings in real-time while analyzing engagement metrics and sentiment. It generates reports containing key points, action items, and analytics about speaking time and attention scores. Beyond meeting assistance, it provides searchable transcripts across all meetings, summarizes Slack threads and emails, and integrates with platforms like Zoom, Teams, and Meet. The system supports over 20 languages and includes features for syncing with Notion, Confluence, and CRM systems.

The platform offers three pricing tiers: a free plan limited to 5 meeting transcripts monthly, a Pro plan at $19.75/user/month (annual) for unlimited meetings and advanced integrations, and an Enterprise plan at $29.75/user/month with video playback capabilities. While Read.ai works with virtual meetings via cloud or extension without meeting bots, it also supports in-person meetings through its iOS app. There's no dedicated desktop application—users access functionality through web apps and browser extensions.

Comparing Avoma and Read.ai

Avoma

• Avoma functions as an AI meeting assistant that records, transcribes, and summarizes meetings, breaking content into organized topics and actionable insights. While it offers high transcription accuracy and integrates with common tools like Zoom and HubSpot, its integration depth is limited and users still need to manually implement many meeting outcomes.

• The platform includes features for agenda templates, live note collaboration, and CRM synchronization, catering particularly to sales and customer success teams. Though Avoma automates administrative tasks around meetings, it falls short on helping users truly act on meeting content, with transcripts sometimes being dense to navigate and the platform potentially overwhelming for simple use cases.

Read.ai

• Read.ai serves as a meeting "copilot" that transcribes meetings while analyzing engagement metrics and sentiment, providing real-time summaries and post-meeting reports with key points and action items. Despite offering analytics on meeting quality and speaker balance, the tool lacks comprehensive workflow integration and doesn't effectively bridge the gap between capturing meeting content and executing on it.

• The platform supports multiple languages, offers AI search across meeting transcripts, and can summarize Slack threads or emails, integrating with systems like Zoom, Teams, and Meet. However, Read.ai's complex interface creates a steeper learning curve, and its limited free tier restricts accessibility, while its integration capabilities don't fully enable users to transform meeting insights into completed tasks.

Avoma tends to work better for sales teams and organizations needing structured meeting documentation with basic automation. Its stronger free tier and complete mobile support make it more accessible for distributed teams that need reliable transcription without complex analytics. The platform's simplicity compared to Read.ai makes it a better fit for smaller organizations looking to reduce administrative overhead.

Read.ai is more suited to larger enterprises concerned with meeting effectiveness and engagement analytics. Its sentiment analysis and speaker metrics appeal to teams focused on improving meeting quality and collaboration patterns. The platform's more robust enterprise features like video playback and searchable knowledge base make it valuable for organizations that treat meeting content as institutional knowledge, despite its more limited free tier and iOS-only mobile support.

Another alternative: Circleback

Circleback provides best-in-class AI-powered meeting notes and automations. We support over 100 languages and automatic participant identification in both in-person and online meetings.

• Automatically-identified and assigned action items

• AI-enabled search across all meetings

• Automations with 100+ app integrations

• Industry-leading security with SOC 2 Type II, EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework, and HIPAA compliance

• Ability to capture both online and in-person meetings with desktop and mobile apps