# Fireflies vs Otter: pricing, features, and which is better > Fireflies.ai and Otter.ai compared across pricing, capture, speaker labels, recordings, notes, sharing, automations, integrations, AI-agent access, and administration. - Canonical HTML: https://circleback.ai/compare/fireflies-ai-vs-otter-ai - Structured JSON: https://circleback.ai/compare/fireflies-ai-vs-otter-ai.json - Comparison directory: https://circleback.ai/compare - Language: en-US - Editorial perspective: Neutral competitor comparison. Circleback appears only as a clearly labeled third option. ## Short answer Fireflies has broader capture, integrations, API, and live sales help. Otter is easier to understand: affordable live transcription, mobile recording, and searchable conversations. The useful buying test is to run both products on the same external call, internal planning session, and noisy in-person meeting. Compare the result, the sharing defaults, and the work that still has to happen by hand. ## Fireflies.ai at a glance Fireflies is one of the broadest meeting assistants: bot, desktop, mobile, integrations, search, API, and live or sales assistance. The nuanced bit is that its capture modes are not equivalent—bot-free desktop gives up recordings, named speakers, and Sales Assist. **Best for:** Teams that prioritize a large integration catalog, live assistance, sales workflows, flexible bot/desktop/mobile capture, and competitive pricing. **Less ideal for:** Teams that expect bot-free capture to preserve the same media, speaker fidelity, and sales intelligence as the bot experience. **Price:** Free; Pro from $10/user/month annually Prices are per user/month: Pro is $10 with annual billing or $18 month-to-month; Business is $19 or $29; Enterprise is $39 with annual billing. Storage, AI credits, video, advanced integrations, and governance differ by plan. **Free option:** Yes. Unlimited transcription requires both Auto-join and Share-all; otherwise initial transcription credits, storage limits, and plan-gated summaries or AI features apply. ### Fireflies.ai strengths - Bot, bot-free macOS/Windows, iOS/Android, uploads, and supported native meeting SDK paths. - A large integration catalog, public API, webhooks, remote MCP, AI apps, live assistance, and Sales Assist. - Automatically generated and assigned action items live in a team-wide task feed and can flow into tools such as Linear, Asana, Monday.com, and Microsoft Planner. - Competitive pricing and 100+ language claims make it accessible to distributed teams. - Meeting content is not used to train internal or external AI models, and compliance modes can retain the full record, text only, summary only, or summary plus audio. ### Fireflies.ai tradeoffs - Bot-free desktop mode stores no audio/video, labels speakers generically, and cannot run Sales Assist. - Fireflies says mobile recordings often do not auto-detect speakers, so in-person transcripts may need manual speaker relabeling. - The Google Meet SDK bot-free path asks attendees for approval, so “bot-free” does not always mean invisible or frictionless. - The advertised unlimited free transcription is conditional: users must enable both automatic bot joining and automatic sharing with every participant. Teams choosing tighter defaults fall back to a small transcription-credit allowance. - Meeting recaps default to workspace-wide access plus anyone with the link. Admins can enforce safer defaults and Enterprise rules can protect sensitive categories, but teams should configure this before broad rollout. - Two current Fireflies help articles disagree on whether Free includes 400 or 800 stored minutes, so confirm the live limit before relying on long-term free storage. - Advanced AI features use workspace-pooled credits that do not increase with seat count, so heavier teams may need a paid credit add-on. - The GraphQL API exposes transcripts and core meeting data but not Super Summaries or Custom Apps output. - The MCP server is much richer than the older API-only story, but some advanced search and fetch tools are still marked experimental, and data sent to an external AI no longer receives Fireflies’ zero-data-retention guarantee. - Company relationship context and general-purpose native automations are less cohesive than the sheer integration count suggests. ### Choose Fireflies.ai when - A large integration catalog and live assistance are high priorities. - You are happy to use the Fireflies bot when you need recordings, named speakers, and Sales Assist. - You want mobile and desktop capture at a lower entry price than many competitors. ## Otter.ai at a glance Otter remains one of the easiest names to recognize in live transcription. It now offers meeting agents, automatically assigned action items, workflows, cross-meeting chat, desktop/mobile apps, two-way AI Chat connectors, MCP, and CRM connections, while minute caps and enterprise-only video/API features shape the real value. **Best for:** Students, individuals, and teams that prioritize live text, simple mobile capture, an inexpensive Pro plan, and a familiar transcript-first experience. **Less ideal for:** Teams needing broad multilingual support, video replay on ordinary plans, unlimited usage without caveats, deep operational automations, or mature whole-company context. **Price:** Free; Pro from $8.33/user/month annually Basic includes 300 transcription minutes per month, a 30-minute cap per conversation, three lifetime file imports, and access to the 25 most recent conversations. Paid prices are per user/month: Pro is $8.33 with annual billing or $16.99 month-to-month, with 1,200 in-app minutes, 90-minute meetings, and ten monthly imports; Business is $19.99 or $30 and adds unlimited in-app meetings, four-hour meetings, and more administration. Enterprise is custom and gates API/webhooks, video replay, SSO/SCIM, and some compliance options. **Free option:** Yes: 300 minutes per month, 30 minutes per conversation, three lifetime imports, and a 25-conversation visible history. ### Otter.ai strengths - Polished live transcript, speaker identification, mobile apps, playback, and cross-meeting chat. - The macOS and Windows desktop app can detect Zoom, Teams, Meet, and other browser calls, then either prompt or begin bot-free recording automatically. - A useful free plan and inexpensive Pro entry point for lower-volume users. - Meeting agents and custom workflows broaden it beyond simple transcription, while MCP makes notes available to AI tools. - Otter automatically assigns detected action items and gives each person a cross-meeting list for editing, reassignment, source lookup, and completion. - Conversations can be exported individually in TXT, DOCX, PDF, SRT, and MP3; Business adds bulk export and Enterprise adds granular media/transcript retention controls. ### Otter.ai tradeoffs - Basic and Pro have monthly minute, per-meeting, and import limits that matter for meeting-heavy professionals; Basic only exposes the 25 most recent conversations. - Video replay is an Enterprise feature and is limited to supported Zoom and Google Meet recordings. - API/webhooks, SSO/SCIM, and HIPAA options are Enterprise-gated. - Transcription covers six languages; German and Simplified Chinese are beta, and only French can switch automatically with English in the same conversation. - AI Chat connectors work only in Advanced mode and vary by plan. Outlook email actions remain unsupported, the mobile app still uses the older AI Chat experience, and several Enterprise exports or integrations need account-manager setup. - The global action-item view is personal rather than manager-wide: users can see tasks assigned to themselves, but not a workspace-wide board of everyone’s work. - On ordinary plans, Otter says it trains proprietary models on de-identified audio and transcripts. Enterprise workspaces are opted out by default; third-party AI providers are prohibited from training on customer data. ### Choose Otter.ai when - Live transcription and easy mobile capture matter more than retaining video. - Your usage fits comfortably inside the free or Pro minute limits. - You want an established transcript-first product with lightweight workflows and agent access. ## Feature comparison | What matters | Fireflies.ai | Otter.ai | | --- | --- | --- | | Capture options | Broad support — Bot, bot-free desktop, mobile, and SDK-based capture. Fireflies has unusually broad capture. The modes differ: desktop bot-free capture works across apps but drops stored media and named speaker labels; the bot preserves the richer meeting record. | Broad support — Meeting agent or automatic bot-free desktop capture, plus mobile. Otter can join major meeting platforms, capture from its apps, and show text live. Its desktop app can detect Zoom, Teams, Meet, and other browser calls from microphone activity, then stay off, prompt the user, or start recording automatically for each meeting type. Scheduling and limits depend on the chosen plan. | | Desktop and mobile | Broad support — Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, and Android. Desktop supports system-audio recording and live assistance. Mobile supports in-person recording, reviewing meetings, search, sharing, and tasks. | Broad support — Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, and Android. Broad app coverage makes Otter easy to use in virtual or room conversations. The desktop app now supports configurable automatic recording for detected calls. Feature parity and allowances differ between in-app and imported usage. | | In-person capture and speaker labels | Broad support — Mobile and desktop room capture. iOS and Android can capture in-person conversations. Fireflies documents that mobile recordings often do not auto-detect speakers, so names may need manual correction. Bot-free desktop can also hear room/system audio, with its own media and generic-label caveats. | Broad support — Strong mobile live transcription. iOS and Android are mature room-recording tools with live text. Otter separates voices after processing and can learn previously tagged speakers, but new or uncertain voices remain Speaker 1 or Unknown until tagged. Live platform-name labels are a separate Notetaker behavior, strongest on Zoom. | | Recordings, playback, and clips | Available with limits — Bot mode saves AV; bot-free desktop saves neither. This is the key evaluation detail: bot meetings can preserve audio/video and named speakers, while desktop bot-free mode produces notes/transcript without recording files and uses Speaker 1/Speaker 2 labels. | Available with limits — Audio playback broadly; video replay on Enterprise. Audio is synchronized to text on ordinary plans. Video replay requires Enterprise and currently applies to supported Zoom and Google Meet recordings rather than every capture path. | | Notes, action items, and search | Broad support — Notes, search, and a workspace-wide assigned task feed. Fireflies offers strong meeting search and multiple AI surfaces. It automatically creates and assigns meeting tasks, lets teams manage all accessible tasks in one feed, and can turn action items into trackable work in several project tools. Usage credits and plan gates still apply to advanced AI apps and assistant capabilities. | Broad support — Live transcript, search, and automatically assigned action items. Otter’s transcript experience is mature. It automatically detects and assigns action items, links generated work back to transcript evidence, and gives each user a cross-meeting list with edit, reassign, and completion controls. That list only shows work assigned to the signed-in person, rather than a workspace-wide manager view. Allowances and advanced custom workflows vary by plan. | | People, companies, and context | Available with limits — Meeting channels and cross-meeting search. The meeting library is searchable and collaborative, but the product is less centered on a unified relationship timeline combining meetings, email, calendar, people, and companies. | Available with limits — Cross-meeting search and chat. Otter can answer across conversations, but does not emphasize full relationship pages combining meetings, email, calendar, people, companies, and future events. | | Automatic sharing and workspace defaults | Broad support — Enterprise rules can auto-route, share, and enforce privacy. Enterprise admins can match meeting title, host, participants, or internal/external type, then route to a channel, share with users or teams, or enforce privacy. This is genuinely strong automation. The default recap visibility is broader than many buyers expect—teammates plus anyone holding the link—so configure the workspace default deliberately. | Available with limits — User auto-share and Enterprise workspace defaults. Individuals can auto-share by calendar audience and use channels. Enterprise admins can choose the options members see and set a default, but ordinary audience defaults are not fully locked; admins can only force privacy by leaving “Don’t share” as the sole option. External auto-share channels are also Enterprise-only. | | Automations | Broad support — Meeting rules, AI apps, CRM workflows, and automatic task handoff. Fireflies can automatically create and assign tasks, then route them to Linear, Asana, Monday.com, Planner, Salesforce, and other systems with meeting filters on eligible plans. It also supports specialized AI apps. The experience spans several feature systems rather than one simple general condition/action canvas. | Available with limits — Meeting agents and custom workflows, with plan differences. Otter automatically detects and assigns action items, tracks each person’s work across meetings, can create Jira issues with assignees and due dates, and uses custom workflows, Zapier, and AI Chat actions for role-specific output and downstream work. The personal action view does not give a manager one board for every assignee, and connector or workflow eligibility varies by plan. | | Integrations | Broad support — 100+ integrations plus Zapier and API. Breadth is a major advantage across CRM, collaboration, storage, dialers, and productivity tools. Verify the plan required for each connector and direction of sync. | Broad support — Meeting platforms, CRM, Zapier, Slack, Jira, work-app connectors, and Enterprise exports. Paid plans connect Salesforce, HubSpot, and Zapier. AI Chat’s Advanced mode can read and act in Gmail, Google Drive, Notion, and Jira, with Salesforce context available separately. Slack can post summaries and action notifications, while Enterprise supports account-manager-enabled SharePoint and automatic Drive exports. Availability and setup vary substantially by plan. | | API, MCP, CLI, and data portability | Broad support — GraphQL API, webhooks, and a rich remote MCP server. Fireflies exposes transcripts and core meeting data through GraphQL plus webhooks for custom integrations. Its OAuth or API-key remote MCP server can retrieve full transcripts, summaries, action items, active meetings, analytics, soundbites, channels, and user data; it can also share, rename, organize, and clip meetings. Some advanced search and fetch tools remain experimental. Super Summary and Custom Apps data are still absent from the documented GraphQL API, and content passed into an external AI follows that provider’s retention terms. | Available with limits — MCP broadly; API and webhooks on Enterprise. MCP is listed even on Basic and can access meetings captured by or shared with the authenticated user. It currently has no public API-key setup for arbitrary AI applications. The public API and webhooks require Enterprise and account-manager enablement. | | Security, privacy, and admin | Broad support — Business and Enterprise governance. Enterprise adds SSO/SCIM, Rules Engine governance, custom retention, and private storage. Its Super Admin role can access every workspace meeting, including “Only Me” content—useful for compliance, but a material privacy-policy decision. Fireflies says meeting content is never used for internal or external model training. | Available with limits — Business administration; advanced security on Enterprise. Business adds centralized features and bulk export. Enterprise adds SSO, SCIM, API access, video replay, granular retention, no-training by default, and HIPAA options. Several advanced controls—including retention and automatic Drive export—require account-manager setup. | | Languages | Broad support — 100+ languages advertised. Fireflies advertises broad transcription coverage. Real-world speaker separation and accuracy still depend on capture mode, room acoustics, accents, and vocabulary. | Narrow or indirect — Six transcription languages, two still in beta. Otter transcribes English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, and spoken Mandarin with Simplified Chinese output. German and Chinese are beta. It normally handles one language per conversation; French can auto-switch with English, and other mixed-language pairs are not supported. | Ratings describe documented breadth rather than overall product quality: - **Broad support:** Broad native support across the product or relevant paid plans. - **Available with limits:** Documented support with meaningful scope, mode, or plan limits. - **Narrow or indirect:** Narrow, indirect, beta, or substantially plan-gated support. - **Not documented:** No current first-party documentation for a native option. ## Detailed analysis ### Capture options **Both products document broad support for capture options, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** Bot, bot-free desktop, mobile, and SDK-based capture. Fireflies has unusually broad capture. The modes differ: desktop bot-free capture works across apps but drops stored media and named speaker labels; the bot preserves the richer meeting record. Evidence: [Fireflies bot-free desktop recording](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/6666374717-how-to-record-meetings-without-a-bot-on-the-fireflies-desktop-app), [Fireflies desktop app](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/1208704416-getting-started-with-the-fireflies-desktop-app). **Otter.ai:** Meeting agent or automatic bot-free desktop capture, plus mobile. Otter can join major meeting platforms, capture from its apps, and show text live. Its desktop app can detect Zoom, Teams, Meet, and other browser calls from microphone activity, then stay off, prompt the user, or start recording automatically for each meeting type. Scheduling and limits depend on the chosen plan. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter desktop automatic recording](https://otter.ai/blog/never-miss-the-conversation-introducing-automatic-recording-in-otter-desktop). ### Desktop and mobile **Both products document broad support for desktop and mobile, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, and Android. Desktop supports system-audio recording and live assistance. Mobile supports in-person recording, reviewing meetings, search, sharing, and tasks. Evidence: [Fireflies desktop app](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/1208704416-getting-started-with-the-fireflies-desktop-app), [Fireflies mobile app](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8937818258-learn-about-fireflies-mobile-app). **Otter.ai:** Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, and Android. Broad app coverage makes Otter easy to use in virtual or room conversations. The desktop app now supports configurable automatic recording for detected calls. Feature parity and allowances differ between in-app and imported usage. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter desktop automatic recording](https://otter.ai/blog/never-miss-the-conversation-introducing-automatic-recording-in-otter-desktop). ### In-person capture and speaker labels **Both products document broad support for in-person capture and speaker labels, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** Mobile and desktop room capture. iOS and Android can capture in-person conversations. Fireflies documents that mobile recordings often do not auto-detect speakers, so names may need manual correction. Bot-free desktop can also hear room/system audio, with its own media and generic-label caveats. Evidence: [Fireflies mobile app](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8937818258-learn-about-fireflies-mobile-app), [Fireflies speaker labels](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4994477228-how-to-edit-speaker-labels-or-names-in-a-transcript). **Otter.ai:** Strong mobile live transcription. iOS and Android are mature room-recording tools with live text. Otter separates voices after processing and can learn previously tagged speakers, but new or uncertain voices remain Speaker 1 or Unknown until tagged. Live platform-name labels are a separate Notetaker behavior, strongest on Zoom. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter speaker identification](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/21665587209367-Speaker-Identification-Overview). ### Recordings, playback, and clips **Both products support recordings, playback, and clips, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** Bot mode saves AV; bot-free desktop saves neither. This is the key evaluation detail: bot meetings can preserve audio/video and named speakers, while desktop bot-free mode produces notes/transcript without recording files and uses Speaker 1/Speaker 2 labels. Evidence: [Fireflies bot-free desktop recording](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/6666374717-how-to-record-meetings-without-a-bot-on-the-fireflies-desktop-app). **Otter.ai:** Audio playback broadly; video replay on Enterprise. Audio is synchronized to text on ordinary plans. Video replay requires Enterprise and currently applies to supported Zoom and Google Meet recordings rather than every capture path. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter conversation export](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/360047733634-Export-conversations). ### Notes, action items, and search **Both products document broad support for notes, action items, and search, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** Notes, search, and a workspace-wide assigned task feed. Fireflies offers strong meeting search and multiple AI surfaces. It automatically creates and assigns meeting tasks, lets teams manage all accessible tasks in one feed, and can turn action items into trackable work in several project tools. Usage credits and plan gates still apply to advanced AI apps and assistant capabilities. Evidence: [Fireflies pricing guide](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3734844560-learn-about-the-fireflies-pricing-plans), [Fireflies AI credits](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/9606045468-fireflies-billing-terms), [Fireflies Tasks Feed](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/1574234155-learn-about-the-tasks-feed). **Otter.ai:** Live transcript, search, and automatically assigned action items. Otter’s transcript experience is mature. It automatically detects and assigns action items, links generated work back to transcript evidence, and gives each user a cross-meeting list with edit, reassign, and completion controls. That list only shows work assigned to the signed-in person, rather than a workspace-wide manager view. Allowances and advanced custom workflows vary by plan. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter action items](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/25983095114519-Action-Items-Overview), [Otter automatic action-item assignment](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/5093228433687-Conversation-Page-Overview). ### People, companies, and context **Both products support people, companies, and context, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** Meeting channels and cross-meeting search. The meeting library is searchable and collaborative, but the product is less centered on a unified relationship timeline combining meetings, email, calendar, people, and companies. Evidence: [Fireflies pricing guide](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3734844560-learn-about-the-fireflies-pricing-plans). **Otter.ai:** Cross-meeting search and chat. Otter can answer across conversations, but does not emphasize full relationship pages combining meetings, email, calendar, people, companies, and future events. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing). ### Automatic sharing and workspace defaults **Fireflies has broader documented support for automatic sharing and workspace defaults.** **Fireflies.ai:** Enterprise rules can auto-route, share, and enforce privacy. Enterprise admins can match meeting title, host, participants, or internal/external type, then route to a channel, share with users or teams, or enforce privacy. This is genuinely strong automation. The default recap visibility is broader than many buyers expect—teammates plus anyone holding the link—so configure the workspace default deliberately. Evidence: [Fireflies Rules Engine](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4608292950-learn-about-the-rules-engine-feature), [Fireflies recap privacy defaults](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/5319481450-how-to-configure-privacy-settings-for-your-meeting-recaps). **Otter.ai:** User auto-share and Enterprise workspace defaults. Individuals can auto-share by calendar audience and use channels. Enterprise admins can choose the options members see and set a default, but ordinary audience defaults are not fully locked; admins can only force privacy by leaving “Don’t share” as the sole option. External auto-share channels are also Enterprise-only. Evidence: [Otter automatic sharing](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/20424842990999-Manage-auto-share-settings), [Otter workspace auto-share controls](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/32589333117591-Manage-Workspace-auto-share-settings). ### Automations **Fireflies has broader documented support for automations.** **Fireflies.ai:** Meeting rules, AI apps, CRM workflows, and automatic task handoff. Fireflies can automatically create and assign tasks, then route them to Linear, Asana, Monday.com, Planner, Salesforce, and other systems with meeting filters on eligible plans. It also supports specialized AI apps. The experience spans several feature systems rather than one simple general condition/action canvas. Evidence: [Fireflies Rules Engine](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4608292950-learn-about-the-rules-engine-feature), [Fireflies pricing guide](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3734844560-learn-about-the-fireflies-pricing-plans), [Fireflies Tasks Feed](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/1574234155-learn-about-the-tasks-feed), [Fireflies Linear integration](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8360629677-how-to-integrate-linear-with-fireflies). **Otter.ai:** Meeting agents and custom workflows, with plan differences. Otter automatically detects and assigns action items, tracks each person’s work across meetings, can create Jira issues with assignees and due dates, and uses custom workflows, Zapier, and AI Chat actions for role-specific output and downstream work. The personal action view does not give a manager one board for every assignee, and connector or workflow eligibility varies by plan. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter action items](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/25983095114519-Action-Items-Overview), [Otter automatic action-item assignment](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/5093228433687-Conversation-Page-Overview), [Otter Jira integration](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/40485786582551-Connect-Jira-to-Otter-ai), [Otter AI Chat connectors](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/19682180167575-Otter-AI-Chat-Overview). ### Integrations **Both products document broad support for integrations, with different scope and plan limits.** **Fireflies.ai:** 100+ integrations plus Zapier and API. Breadth is a major advantage across CRM, collaboration, storage, dialers, and productivity tools. Verify the plan required for each connector and direction of sync. Evidence: [Fireflies integration directory](https://fireflies.ai/integrations), [Fireflies Linear integration](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8360629677-how-to-integrate-linear-with-fireflies). **Otter.ai:** Meeting platforms, CRM, Zapier, Slack, Jira, work-app connectors, and Enterprise exports. Paid plans connect Salesforce, HubSpot, and Zapier. AI Chat’s Advanced mode can read and act in Gmail, Google Drive, Notion, and Jira, with Salesforce context available separately. Slack can post summaries and action notifications, while Enterprise supports account-manager-enabled SharePoint and automatic Drive exports. Availability and setup vary substantially by plan. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter AI Chat connectors](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/19682180167575-Otter-AI-Chat-Overview), [Otter Jira integration](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/40485786582551-Connect-Jira-to-Otter-ai), [Otter Slack integration](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/13627121851799-Connect-Slack-to-Otter-ai), [Otter SharePoint export](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/38533740881175-Connect-Microsoft-SharePoint-to-Otter-ai). ### API, MCP, CLI, and data portability **Fireflies has broader documented support for API, MCP, CLI, and data portability.** **Fireflies.ai:** GraphQL API, webhooks, and a rich remote MCP server. Fireflies exposes transcripts and core meeting data through GraphQL plus webhooks for custom integrations. Its OAuth or API-key remote MCP server can retrieve full transcripts, summaries, action items, active meetings, analytics, soundbites, channels, and user data; it can also share, rename, organize, and clip meetings. Some advanced search and fetch tools remain experimental. Super Summary and Custom Apps data are still absent from the documented GraphQL API, and content passed into an external AI follows that provider’s retention terms. Evidence: [Fireflies API](https://docs.fireflies.ai/introduction), [Fireflies MCP tools](https://docs.fireflies.ai/mcp-tools/overview). **Otter.ai:** MCP broadly; API and webhooks on Enterprise. MCP is listed even on Basic and can access meetings captured by or shared with the authenticated user. It currently has no public API-key setup for arbitrary AI applications. The public API and webhooks require Enterprise and account-manager enablement. Evidence: [Otter MCP server](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/35287607569687-Otter-MCP-Server), [Otter public API](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/4412365535895-Does-Otter-offer-an-open-API). ### Security, privacy, and admin **Fireflies has broader documented support for security, privacy, and admin.** **Fireflies.ai:** Business and Enterprise governance. Enterprise adds SSO/SCIM, Rules Engine governance, custom retention, and private storage. Its Super Admin role can access every workspace meeting, including “Only Me” content—useful for compliance, but a material privacy-policy decision. Fireflies says meeting content is never used for internal or external model training. Evidence: [Fireflies pricing guide](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3734844560-learn-about-the-fireflies-pricing-plans), [Fireflies storage limits](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4777633252-learn-about-meeting-storage-limits), [Fireflies Rules Engine](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4608292950-learn-about-the-rules-engine-feature), [Fireflies data safety](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/2154538358-policy-on-keeping-information-safe), [Fireflies compliance recording modes](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3598930706-set-up-transcript-only-mode-for-compliance), [Fireflies Enterprise controls](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4771323041-learn-about-fireflies-enterprise-plan). **Otter.ai:** Business administration; advanced security on Enterprise. Business adds centralized features and bulk export. Enterprise adds SSO, SCIM, API access, video replay, granular retention, no-training by default, and HIPAA options. Several advanced controls—including retention and automatic Drive export—require account-manager setup. Evidence: [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing), [Otter workspace auto-share controls](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/32589333117591-Manage-Workspace-auto-share-settings), [Otter privacy and model training](https://otter.ai/privacy-security), [Otter Enterprise controls](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/13352505516695-Enterprise-Admin-Controls-Overview), [Otter retention policy](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/19500988656279-Set-a-custom-Data-Retention-policy), [Otter conversation export](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/360047733634-Export-conversations). ### Languages **Fireflies has broader documented support for languages.** **Fireflies.ai:** 100+ languages advertised. Fireflies advertises broad transcription coverage. Real-world speaker separation and accuracy still depend on capture mode, room acoustics, accents, and vocabulary. Evidence: [Fireflies pricing guide](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3734844560-learn-about-the-fireflies-pricing-plans). **Otter.ai:** Six transcription languages, two still in beta. Otter transcribes English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, and spoken Mandarin with Simplified Chinese output. German and Chinese are beta. It normally handles one language per conversation; French can auto-switch with English, and other mixed-language pairs are not supported. Evidence: [Otter supported languages](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/26660468516631-Transcribe-conversations-in-English-Spanish-French-German-Japanese-or-Chinese-Simplified). ## A third option to consider: Circleback Circleback turns online meetings, in-person conversations, and imported calls into one shared company memory. Record with a bot, with the botless desktop app, from an iPhone or Android phone, or on Apple Watch. Every route produces the same speaker-labeled record, detailed notes designed to stand alone, and automatically assigned action items. Sharing rules and automations carry the useful parts into the teams and tools that need them. Circleback is built for people and AI agents: the complete meeting record available to a person is also available programmatically through its API, MCP, and CLI. Circleback can also search connected apps and take action in them. It is built for people and AI agents: the same complete meeting data available to a person is available programmatically to ChatGPT, Claude, other agents, and internal tools through the API, MCP, and CLI. Free; Pro from $15/user/month annually; Business from $25/user/month annually; Enterprise $35/user/month, billed annually. ## Frequently asked questions ### Which is better: Fireflies.ai or Otter.ai? Fireflies has broader capture, integrations, API, and live sales help. Otter is easier to understand: affordable live transcription, mobile recording, and searchable conversations. ### Which is less expensive, Fireflies.ai or Otter.ai? Fireflies.ai: Free; Pro from $10/user/month annually. Otter.ai: Free; Pro from $8.33/user/month annually. Compare the paid seats, included usage, recording access, and admin features you actually need. ### Can Fireflies.ai and Otter.ai record without a bot? Fireflies.ai: Bot, bot-free desktop, mobile, and SDK-based capture. Otter.ai: Meeting agent or automatic bot-free desktop capture, plus mobile. The useful check is whether your required capture mode keeps video, a recording, and speaker names. ### Which is better for a whole company? First ask who gets each note automatically; otherwise useful context stays with the recorder. Then compare permissions, retention, and enforced defaults. Fireflies: Enterprise rules can auto-route, share, and enforce privacy. Otter: User auto-share and Enterprise workspace defaults. ### Can I access and move the full meeting data? Fireflies: GraphQL API, webhooks, and a rich remote MCP server. Otter: MCP broadly; API and webhooks on Enterprise. Check the selected plan, authentication model, transcript scope, export format, and retention window for the workflow you need. ### How was this comparison researched? We use first-party pricing pages, product pages, help docs, and release notes for both products. The sources are linked below. ## Methodology Circleback reviews first-party pricing pages, product pages, help docs, and release notes. Prices and capabilities move, so check the linked sources when a detail is important to your decision. Every feature dimension links to the exact first-party documents used for that claim. Ratings describe documented breadth, not an overall score or winner. This page is a neutral competitor-to-competitor comparison. There are no paid placements or affiliate rankings. ## First-party sources ### Fireflies.ai sources - [Fireflies pricing guide](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3734844560-learn-about-the-fireflies-pricing-plans): July 2026 prices and plan structure. - [Fireflies unlimited free transcripts](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8632872350-how-to-get-unlimited-meeting-transcripts-on-fireflies-ai-s-free-plan): Auto-join and Share-all requirements for unlimited free transcription. - [Fireflies storage limits](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4777633252-learn-about-meeting-storage-limits): Current storage limits by plan; its Free figure conflicts with an older Free-plan article. - [Fireflies bot-free desktop recording](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/6666374717-how-to-record-meetings-without-a-bot-on-the-fireflies-desktop-app): No AV files, generic speakers, and Sales Assist limitation. - [Fireflies desktop app](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/1208704416-getting-started-with-the-fireflies-desktop-app): Capture modes, Live Assist, and bot versus botless behavior. - [Fireflies mobile app](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8937818258-learn-about-fireflies-mobile-app): iOS/Android in-person recording, search, sharing, and tasks. - [Fireflies speaker labels](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4994477228-how-to-edit-speaker-labels-or-names-in-a-transcript): Manual corrections and the mobile-recording speaker-detection caveat. - [Fireflies API](https://docs.fireflies.ai/introduction): GraphQL authentication, user/admin scope, available meeting data, and current Super Summary/Custom Apps gaps. - [Fireflies MCP tools](https://docs.fireflies.ai/mcp-tools/overview): Remote MCP authentication, full meeting-data access, read/write tools, and experimental-tool status. - [Fireflies AI credits](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/9606045468-fireflies-billing-terms): Workspace-pooled credit allowances, non-seat scaling, and add-on behavior. - [Fireflies Tasks Feed](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/1574234155-learn-about-the-tasks-feed): Automatic task generation and assignment, all-team task views, completion, reassignment, and project-tool handoff. - [Fireflies Linear integration](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/8360629677-how-to-integrate-linear-with-fireflies): Automatic issue creation, project and status routing, assigned-task filtering, and meeting-rule conditions. - [Fireflies integration directory](https://fireflies.ai/integrations): Current first-party directory advertising 100+ integrations across CRM, project, collaboration, storage, and other categories. - [Fireflies Rules Engine](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4608292950-learn-about-the-rules-engine-feature): Enterprise conditions and actions for routing, automatic sharing, privacy enforcement, and deletion. - [Fireflies recap privacy defaults](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/5319481450-how-to-configure-privacy-settings-for-your-meeting-recaps): Default teammates-and-link visibility, narrower audience choices, and retroactive privacy changes. - [Fireflies data safety](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/2154538358-policy-on-keeping-information-safe): No-training and third-party zero-retention commitments plus governance controls. - [Fireflies compliance recording modes](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/3598930706-set-up-transcript-only-mode-for-compliance): Full-record, text-only, summary-only, and summary-plus-audio retention modes. - [Fireflies Enterprise controls](https://guide.fireflies.ai/articles/4771323041-learn-about-fireflies-enterprise-plan): SSO, SCIM, private storage, retention, and Super Admin access behavior. ### Otter.ai sources - [Otter pricing](https://otter.ai/pricing): Current free, Pro, Business, and Enterprise allowances and feature gates. - [Otter Basic-plan limits](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/360047538094-Conversation-import-and-app-limits-on-the-Basic-free-plan): Monthly minutes, per-conversation duration, lifetime imports, and 25-conversation history. - [Otter desktop automatic recording](https://otter.ai/blog/never-miss-the-conversation-introducing-automatic-recording-in-otter-desktop): August 2026 automatic detection, reminders, and bot-free recording behavior for Zoom, Teams, Meet, and other browser calls. - [Otter automatic sharing](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/20424842990999-Manage-auto-share-settings): Workspace defaults for automatic audience, collaborator permissions, and meeting-level overrides. - [Otter supported languages](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/26660468516631-Transcribe-conversations-in-English-Spanish-French-German-Japanese-or-Chinese-Simplified): Six-language scope, beta languages, one-language behavior, French/English switching, and reprocessing limits. - [Otter speaker identification](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/21665587209367-Speaker-Identification-Overview): Post-processing diarization, learned speaker names, generic labels for new voices, and live Zoom behavior. - [Otter action items](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/25983095114519-Action-Items-Overview): Cross-meeting personal action-item view, transcript links, editing, reassignment, completion, and the lack of a workspace-wide all-assignees view. - [Otter automatic action-item assignment](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/5093228433687-Conversation-Page-Overview): Automatic detection and assignment of meeting action items to relevant workspace members. - [Otter AI Chat connectors](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/19682180167575-Otter-AI-Chat-Overview): Advanced-mode Gmail, Google Drive, Jira, Notion, and Salesforce connector capabilities plus plan and mobile-version caveats. - [Otter Jira integration](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/40485786582551-Connect-Jira-to-Otter-ai): Automatic Jira issue creation from meeting actions with assignees, due dates, projects, source links, and AI Chat access. - [Otter Slack integration](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/13627121851799-Connect-Slack-to-Otter-ai): Summary posting, recurring-meeting delivery, rich previews, access handling, and action-item notifications. - [Otter SharePoint export](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/38533740881175-Connect-Microsoft-SharePoint-to-Otter-ai): Enterprise automatic transcript, summary, and metadata export plus administrator and account-manager setup. - [Otter workspace auto-share controls](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/32589333117591-Manage-Workspace-auto-share-settings): Enterprise eligibility, selectable defaults, user overrides, and the privacy-lock exception. - [Otter MCP server](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/35287607569687-Otter-MCP-Server): Authenticated meeting scope, shared meetings, supported clients, and lack of a public MCP API key. - [Otter public API](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/4412365535895-Does-Otter-offer-an-open-API): Enterprise-only public API availability and account-manager enablement. - [Otter privacy and model training](https://otter.ai/privacy-security): Proprietary-model training on de-identified recordings and transcripts, plus third-party provider no-training and zero-storage commitments. - [Otter Enterprise controls](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/13352505516695-Enterprise-Admin-Controls-Overview): Enterprise no-training default, 2FA, export controls, audio removal, and advanced governance. - [Otter retention policy](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/19500988656279-Set-a-custom-Data-Retention-policy): Account-manager configured retention for full conversations, recordings, or transcripts. - [Otter conversation export](https://help.otter.ai/hc/en-us/articles/360047733634-Export-conversations): Individual and Business bulk exports across text, subtitle, and audio formats.