# Gong vs Otter: pricing, features, and which is better

> Gong 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/gong-vs-otter-ai
- Structured JSON: https://circleback.ai/compare/gong-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

Gong fits a sales organization buying coaching and forecast discipline. Otter fits people who mainly need affordable live transcription, mobile capture, 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.

## Gong at a glance

Gong captures customer interactions and turns them into sales coaching, deal intelligence, pipeline inspection, forecasting, and engagement workflows. It is much more than a note taker—and that is both its superpower and its cost.

**Best for:** Mature go-to-market organizations that want rep coaching, deal inspection, pipeline forecasting, conversation intelligence, and sales engagement in one suite.

**Less ideal for:** A whole company looking for a light, shared memory across engineering, product, recruiting, leadership, and internal conversations.

**Price:** Custom quote: per-user licenses plus a platform fee

Gong does not publish a self-serve price. Its pricing page says cost combines a per-user license with a platform fee, and capabilities such as Forecast, Engage, Enable, and Data Cloud are organized as additional packages.

**Free option:** No self-serve free plan or free trial is advertised; request a demo and quote.

### Gong strengths

- Mature sales coaching, call libraries, scorecards, deal inspection, pipeline analytics, and forecasting workflows.
- Captures calls, meetings, and email in a customer-account context designed for revenue teams.
- Native Zoom recording avoids a Gong bot for eligible company-hosted Zoom calls, while iOS and Android cover face-to-face conversations.
- A mature public API, data exports, and a new MCP server give engineering and AI tools useful access to Gong’s revenue context.
- Gong Engage has a mature sales to-do system with AI-recommended follow-ups, due dates, completion state, rep and manager views, and direct email or call execution.

### Gong tradeoffs

- Pricing is opaque and includes a platform fee; important workflows are split across packages.
- Its data model, vocabulary, rollout, and analytics are sales-first, which can create another silo for non-GTM teams.
- It is a substantial platform to administer when the actual need is meeting notes, shared context, and reliable follow-through rather than revenue operations.
- Standard retention is the shorter of three years or the customer term, but calls placed in the company library are excluded. Shortening retention can also reduce the history behind Gong insights.
- The new MCP server is useful but narrow and read-only: it answers questions about one account or deal and generates briefs rather than returning raw transcripts. MCP and some AI APIs also consume a shared pool of Gong credits.
- Gong’s meeting-follow-up to-dos require the separately packaged Engage product, are fully supported only in English, and auto-dismiss after seven days if no other completion rule fires.

### Choose Gong when

- Forecasting, rep coaching, and deal inspection are the center of the buying decision.
- Your organization wants a full revenue platform and can support an enterprise rollout.
- Sales leaders need opinionated analytics and manager workflows, not just searchable conversation context.

## 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 | Gong | Otter.ai |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Capture options | Broad support — Meeting bot, native Zoom recording, telephony, and mobile capture. Gong captures supported web meetings, calls, and email. Eligible company-hosted Zoom calls can use Zoom-native recording with no Gong bot; other web-conferencing paths generally use the bot. Its mobile app records scheduled or ad-hoc face-to-face conversations. | 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 | Available with limits — Web plus iOS and Android; sales workflows are cloud-first. Mobile apps support recording and review. Gong is primarily an enterprise web platform rather than a general-purpose botless desktop recorder; only its Zoom integration offers native provider recording without the Gong bot. | 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 | Available with limits — Mobile face-to-face audio recording. iOS and Android can capture scheduled or ad-hoc room meetings. Gong separates speakers, but same-room voices may appear as room-name Speaker 1, Speaker 2, and so on until someone edits them; noisy rooms can reduce quality. | 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 | Broad support — Rich call playback, libraries, snippets, and coaching review. Recording review is a core Gong workflow, with synchronized transcript, comments, snippets, libraries, trackers, and manager coaching tools. | 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 — Sales summaries, next steps, account search, and conversation intelligence. Gong excels at finding deal moments, objections, topics, rep behaviors, and next steps. With Engage, recommended meeting follow-ups become due-dated to-dos that can be completed, dismissed, reviewed by managers, and acted on through email or calls. A recommendation can auto-dismiss after seven days if no other completion rule fires. The experience is optimized around customer and revenue questions rather than general company knowledge. | 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 | Broad support — Deep account and deal history for GTM teams. Calls, meetings, and email roll into account and deal context. This is powerful for revenue work but is not positioned as a shared memory for every internal and external company conversation. | 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 | Available with limits — Permissioned call, snippet, and folder sharing. Calls and snippets can be shared internally or externally, and shared folders can grant access to every call they contain. Gong documents automatic capture rules, while post-meeting distribution centers on direct shares, folders, teams, accounts, and coaching libraries. | 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 — Purpose-built revenue workflows and engagement sequences. Gong automates CRM activity, deal signals, alerts, coaching, and sales engagement. Engage flows and AI-recommended to-dos centralize rep work and let managers inspect team queues. It is highly capable inside revenue operations, but this task system is package-gated and less open-ended for arbitrary company workflows. | 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 — Deep CRM, calendar, conferencing, and sales-stack integrations. The integration strategy is strong where revenue teams live: CRMs, dialers, calendars, meeting platforms, and sales engagement systems. | 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 — Mature APIs, exports, data cloud, and a focused MCP server. Gong exposes calls, full speaker-segmented transcripts, users, CRM-linked objects, exports, and data-warehouse tables. Its 2026 MCP server supports personal or organization-wide authorization for ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, and custom agents, but is read-only and limited to account/deal questions and generated briefs—not raw meeting retrieval. Those MCP tools and some AI APIs consume Gong credits. There is no documented first-party CLI. | 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 — Mature enterprise administration and governance. Gong supports large deployments, granular access, SSO/SCIM, retention configuration, deletion, and compliance workflows. Standard retention is the shorter of three years or the customer term and data is deleted 30 days after the relationship ends; company-library calls sit outside the standard rule. | 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 — More than 70 languages; some AI features remain English-only. Gong documents more than 70 transcription languages plus AI translation. Email labels, red-flag alerts, Gong-recommended to-dos, and example-based smart trackers are still English-only, so global teams should verify the exact workflow rather than relying on the headline count. | 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.**

**Gong:** Meeting bot, native Zoom recording, telephony, and mobile capture. Gong captures supported web meetings, calls, and email. Eligible company-hosted Zoom calls can use Zoom-native recording with no Gong bot; other web-conferencing paths generally use the bot. Its mobile app records scheduled or ad-hoc face-to-face conversations.

Evidence: [Gong web-conferencing capture](https://help.gong.io/docs/web-conferencing-integrations), [Gong mobile recording](https://help.gong.io/docs/record-meetings-on-mobile).

**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

**Otter has broader documented support for desktop and mobile.**

**Gong:** Web plus iOS and Android; sales workflows are cloud-first. Mobile apps support recording and review. Gong is primarily an enterprise web platform rather than a general-purpose botless desktop recorder; only its Zoom integration offers native provider recording without the Gong bot.

Evidence: [Gong web-conferencing capture](https://help.gong.io/docs/web-conferencing-integrations), [Gong mobile recording](https://help.gong.io/docs/record-meetings-on-mobile).

**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

**Otter has broader documented support for in-person capture and speaker labels.**

**Gong:** Mobile face-to-face audio recording. iOS and Android can capture scheduled or ad-hoc room meetings. Gong separates speakers, but same-room voices may appear as room-name Speaker 1, Speaker 2, and so on until someone edits them; noisy rooms can reduce quality.

Evidence: [Gong mobile recording](https://help.gong.io/docs/record-meetings-on-mobile), [Gong speaker identification](https://help.gong.io/docs/how-gong-identifies-speakers).

**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

**Gong has broader documented support for recordings, playback, and clips.**

**Gong:** Rich call playback, libraries, snippets, and coaching review. Recording review is a core Gong workflow, with synchronized transcript, comments, snippets, libraries, trackers, and manager coaching tools.

Evidence: [Gong plans and seats](https://help.gong.io/docs/plans-and-seats), [Gong data retention](https://help.gong.io/docs/data-retention-policy).

**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.**

**Gong:** Sales summaries, next steps, account search, and conversation intelligence. Gong excels at finding deal moments, objections, topics, rep behaviors, and next steps. With Engage, recommended meeting follow-ups become due-dated to-dos that can be completed, dismissed, reviewed by managers, and acted on through email or calls. A recommendation can auto-dismiss after seven days if no other completion rule fires. The experience is optimized around customer and revenue questions rather than general company knowledge.

Evidence: [Gong plans and seats](https://help.gong.io/docs/plans-and-seats), [Gong recommended to-dos](https://help.gong.io/docs/gong-recommended-to-dos), [Gong team to-do management](https://help.gong.io/docs/working-with-todos).

**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

**Gong has broader documented support for people, companies, and context.**

**Gong:** Deep account and deal history for GTM teams. Calls, meetings, and email roll into account and deal context. This is powerful for revenue work but is not positioned as a shared memory for every internal and external company conversation.

Evidence: [Gong plans and seats](https://help.gong.io/docs/plans-and-seats).

**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

**Both products support automatic sharing and workspace defaults, with different scope and plan limits.**

**Gong:** Permissioned call, snippet, and folder sharing. Calls and snippets can be shared internally or externally, and shared folders can grant access to every call they contain. Gong documents automatic capture rules, while post-meeting distribution centers on direct shares, folders, teams, accounts, and coaching libraries.

Evidence: [Gong call and folder sharing](https://help.gong.io/docs/enable-call-and-folder-sharing).

**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

**Gong has broader documented support for automations.**

**Gong:** Purpose-built revenue workflows and engagement sequences. Gong automates CRM activity, deal signals, alerts, coaching, and sales engagement. Engage flows and AI-recommended to-dos centralize rep work and let managers inspect team queues. It is highly capable inside revenue operations, but this task system is package-gated and less open-ended for arbitrary company workflows.

Evidence: [Gong automation rules](https://help.gong.io/docs/introduction-to-automation-rules), [Gong recommended to-dos](https://help.gong.io/docs/gong-recommended-to-dos), [Gong team to-do management](https://help.gong.io/docs/working-with-todos).

**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.**

**Gong:** Deep CRM, calendar, conferencing, and sales-stack integrations. The integration strategy is strong where revenue teams live: CRMs, dialers, calendars, meeting platforms, and sales engagement systems.

Evidence: [Gong plans and seats](https://help.gong.io/docs/plans-and-seats).

**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

**Gong has broader documented support for API, MCP, CLI, and data portability.**

**Gong:** Mature APIs, exports, data cloud, and a focused MCP server. Gong exposes calls, full speaker-segmented transcripts, users, CRM-linked objects, exports, and data-warehouse tables. Its 2026 MCP server supports personal or organization-wide authorization for ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, and custom agents, but is read-only and limited to account/deal questions and generated briefs—not raw meeting retrieval. Those MCP tools and some AI APIs consume Gong credits. There is no documented first-party CLI.

Evidence: [Gong transcript API](https://help.gong.io/apidocs/retrieve-transcripts-of-calls-by-date-or-callids-v2callstranscript-2), [Gong API overview](https://help.gong.io/docs/what-the-gong-api-provides), [Gong MCP server](https://help.gong.io/docs/about-gong-mcp-server), [Gong MCP setup](https://help.gong.io/docs/create-an-integration-to-connect-to-the-mcp-server), [Gong AI credits](https://help.gong.io/docs/about-gong-credits), [Gong transcript downloads](https://help.gong.io/docs/view-a-call-transcript), [Gong media downloads](https://help.gong.io/docs/download-a-call-or-snippet).

**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

**Gong has broader documented support for security, privacy, and admin.**

**Gong:** Mature enterprise administration and governance. Gong supports large deployments, granular access, SSO/SCIM, retention configuration, deletion, and compliance workflows. Standard retention is the shorter of three years or the customer term and data is deleted 30 days after the relationship ends; company-library calls sit outside the standard rule.

Evidence: [Gong plans and seats](https://help.gong.io/docs/plans-and-seats), [Gong data retention](https://help.gong.io/docs/data-retention-policy).

**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

**Gong has broader documented support for languages.**

**Gong:** More than 70 languages; some AI features remain English-only. Gong documents more than 70 transcription languages plus AI translation. Email labels, red-flag alerts, Gong-recommended to-dos, and example-based smart trackers are still English-only, so global teams should verify the exact workflow rather than relying on the headline count.

Evidence: [Gong language support](https://help.gong.io/docs/what-languages-are-supported-in-gong).

**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: Gong or Otter.ai?

Gong fits a sales organization buying coaching and forecast discipline. Otter fits people who mainly need affordable live transcription, mobile capture, and searchable conversations.

### Which is less expensive, Gong or Otter.ai?

Gong: Custom quote: per-user licenses plus a platform fee. 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 Gong and Otter.ai record without a bot?

Gong: Meeting bot, native Zoom recording, telephony, and mobile 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. Gong: Permissioned call, snippet, and folder sharing. Otter: User auto-share and Enterprise workspace defaults.

### Can I access and move the full meeting data?

Gong: Mature APIs, exports, data cloud, and a focused 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

### Gong sources

- [Gong pricing](https://www.gong.io/pricing): Custom pricing structure, per-user licenses, platform fee, and package model.
- [Gong web-conferencing capture](https://help.gong.io/docs/web-conferencing-integrations): Bot capture across providers and native bot-free recording for eligible Zoom meetings.
- [Gong transcript API](https://help.gong.io/apidocs/retrieve-transcripts-of-calls-by-date-or-callids-v2callstranscript-2): Documented call-transcript endpoint, pagination, filters, and authorization scope.
- [Gong API overview](https://help.gong.io/docs/what-the-gong-api-provides): Calls, full transcripts, analyzed conversation data, users, activity, and CRM-linked API capabilities.
- [Gong MCP server](https://help.gong.io/docs/about-gong-mcp-server): Read-only account/deal questions and brief generation for external AI clients.
- [Gong MCP setup](https://help.gong.io/docs/create-an-integration-to-connect-to-the-mcp-server): Paid-seat requirement, personal or shared authorization, OAuth setup, and official MCP endpoint.
- [Gong AI credits](https://help.gong.io/docs/about-gong-credits): Shared annual credit pool and consumption behavior for MCP, AI APIs, and continuous AI processing.
- [Gong transcript downloads](https://help.gong.io/docs/view-a-call-transcript): Per-call transcript download and synchronized transcript behavior.
- [Gong media downloads](https://help.gong.io/docs/download-a-call-or-snippet): Permissioned audio, video, and snippet downloads on any Gong plan.
- [Gong plans and seats](https://help.gong.io/docs/plans-and-seats): Foundation platform and Enable, Forecast, Engage, and Data Cloud packages.
- [Gong mobile recording](https://help.gong.io/docs/record-meetings-on-mobile): iOS and Android in-person recording behavior and quality considerations.
- [Gong speaker identification](https://help.gong.io/docs/how-gong-identifies-speakers): Speaker separation, same-room generic labels, platform behavior, and optional voice identification.
- [Gong data retention](https://help.gong.io/docs/data-retention-policy): Standard and custom retention behavior.
- [Gong language support](https://help.gong.io/docs/what-languages-are-supported-in-gong): More than 70 transcription languages, AI translation, and the AI capabilities that remain English-only.
- [Gong call and folder sharing](https://help.gong.io/docs/enable-call-and-folder-sharing): Company permissions for external call sharing and internal shared folders.
- [Gong automation rules](https://help.gong.io/docs/introduction-to-automation-rules): Plan availability, supported triggers and actions, and future-only rule application.
- [Gong recommended to-dos](https://help.gong.io/docs/gong-recommended-to-dos): Engage eligibility, AI meeting follow-ups, source timestamps, due dates, completion rules, seven-day expiry, and language limits.
- [Gong team to-do management](https://help.gong.io/docs/working-with-todos): Personal and manager task views, filters, due dates, bulk completion, CRM context, and execution controls.

### 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.
