Granola vs Read AI

Granola

macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, and Apple Watch

Desktop is the full experience. iOS and Android cover in-person conversations, and Apple Watch can start an in-person note with one tap and sync it to the phone and desktop apps. iPhone also supports outbound speakerphone calls but cannot capture another app’s audio; integrations and several workspace settings remain desktop-oriented.

EvidenceGranola iOSGranola Android launchGranola Apple Watch launchGranola transcription

Read AI

Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, and Android

Desktop captures device audio for online meetings. The iPhone and Android apps record in-person conversations and put their reports beside Zoom, Meet, and Teams meetings; neither mobile app can record another app or phone call using the same microphone.

EvidenceRead AI desktop appRead AI iPhone appRead AI Android app

Granola

Phone, Apple Watch, and laptop room capture

The iPhone app handles in-person conversations, identifies up to ten speakers, and can place outbound speakerphone calls. Android and Apple Watch also capture in-person meetings, though their launch pages do not promise the same speaker-label behavior. Desktop does not diarize individual voices: its transcript uses Me and Them for microphone versus system audio. iPhone cannot transcribe another calling app running on the same phone.

EvidenceGranola iOSGranola Android launchGranola Apple Watch launchGranola transcription

Read AI

iOS and Android real-time transcript and summary

Both mobile apps record room conversations with a live transcript and summary. They do not capture phone calls, FaceTime, or a virtual-meeting app on the same device. In shared-room audio, distinct voices may begin as Conference Room — Speaker 1, Speaker 2, and so on; owners and editors can rename or reassign them afterward.

EvidenceRead AI iPhone appRead AI Android appRead AI mobile capture limitsRead AI speaker editing

Granola

No retained audio or video

Granola deliberately deletes audio after transcription. That is a privacy benefit for some teams and a hard limitation for anyone who needs playback, evidence, clips, or coaching review.

EvidenceGranola transcription

Read AI

Playback only on Enterprise and Enterprise+

Pro and free users can receive notes and transcripts, but source media is not a durable playback library. Read documents a 30-day grace period before lower-tier media deletion.

EvidenceRead AI recording availabilityRead AI pricing

Granola

Concise attendee notes, extracted actions, and cross-meeting chat

Human notes influence the generated document, and paid plans support broad chat across meetings, folders, people, and companies. Our editorial judgment is that the output is polished but thin and assumes the reader attended, rather than documenting enough context to stand alone. Granola can extract owner- and deadline-aware action-item text with transcript citations, but it does not create and assign native tasks to users. Those actions remain note content rather than a workspace task system, and there is still no source recording for playback.

EvidenceGranola transcriptionGranola spaces and foldersGranola action-item extraction

Read AI

Summaries, action items, Search Copilot, and coaching analytics

Read’s differentiated layer is live and post-meeting intelligence: engagement, sentiment, speaker stats, action items, and search across connected content. Recommendations can resurface recent work assigned to the user, but Read does not document a full workspace-wide task board with assignee and completion management comparable to dedicated action trackers.

EvidenceRead AI pricingRead AI report distribution

Granola

People and company pages built from calendar contacts

Granola groups meetings around people and companies, with chat across those groups. Directory entries are inferred from calendar data and cannot be manually added, so imperfect associations can happen.

EvidenceGranola workspacesGranola spaces and folders

Read AI

Cross-source Search Copilot

Search can span meetings, email, messages, and documents, which is broader than a transcript library. The experience is a search layer rather than explicit relationship timelines and upcoming-event pages.

EvidenceRead AI pricing

Granola

Private by default; sharing starts with a note or folder

Notes are not auto-shared with attendees. A user shares a note or adds it to a team-space folder; recurring meetings can auto-add to a folder and new folder notes can auto-post to connected tools. Enterprise can enforce how links work across the workspace, but it still does not provide conditional rules that automatically distribute each matching meeting to the right internal people or teams.

EvidenceGranola workspacesGranola spaces and foldersGranola sharing controlsGranola note sharing

Read AI

Workspace-wide participant and team report access

Workspace admins can set automatic report access for internal or external participants and give teams role-based access to matching reports, including retroactive access. Owners can send recaps and recurring-meeting pre-reads through email, Slack, or Teams. Participant rules use calendar invitees, including no-shows, and the owner’s settings govern each report, so teams should configure workspace controls deliberately.

EvidenceRead AI workspace sharing settingsRead AI report distribution

Granola

Folder and manual Zapier triggers; less of a native workflow canvas

Paid users can trigger Zapier when a note is added to a chosen folder or manually shared, then create tasks in Linear, Asana, Trello, Monday, and thousands of other apps. This is useful, but there is no automatic every-meeting trigger in the documented integration and Granola does not center conditional custom extraction and multi-action workflows in the product itself.

EvidenceGranola integrationsGranola spaces and foldersGranola Zapier

Read AI

Recaps, pre-reads, scheduled updates, and agent actions

Read can send post-meeting recaps, recurring-meeting pre-reads, and scheduled topic updates, while Ask Read actions can draft and send email, create calendar events, and update HubSpot after user approval. It is more opinionated around its own agents and intelligence outputs than a general meeting trigger/condition/action canvas.

EvidenceRead AI report distributionRead AI actions

Granola

Notion, Slack, Attio, HubSpot, Affinity, Zapier, API, and MCP

The catalog is now credible, particularly on Business. Zapier can turn folder notes into tasks across 8,000+ apps, while the native catalog remains smaller and more destination-oriented than systems with broad action libraries.

EvidenceGranola integrationsGranola Zapier

Read AI

Calendar, conferencing, email, messaging, documents, and premium connectors

Search Copilot’s cross-source coverage is a strength, although connector eligibility varies by paid plan.

EvidenceRead AI pricing

Granola

MCP and API on Business+; material export and scope limits

Personal API keys are beta on Business/Enterprise and can return transcripts for notes the key owner may access; Enterprise organization keys can cover Team-space notes. MCP also has a transcript tool, but uses OAuth, has no service-account key, and cannot directly access Team-space folders. Bulk CSV export excludes transcripts and admins cannot export every member’s notes, so programmatic access exists but workspace portability is not complete.

EvidenceGranola MCPGranola APIGranola data export

Read AI

Open-beta REST API and MCP with full meeting reports

Read’s API and remote MCP can return meeting metadata, participants, summaries, chapters, action items, topics, metrics, full speaker-labeled transcripts, and recording-download URLs. They are open beta, use browser OAuth with short-lived rotating tokens, lack service credentials and file upload, and only reach reports the user can access unless an admin enables global report access.

EvidenceRead AI API and MCP overviewRead AI MCP tools

Granola

User management on Business; retention and organization controls on Enterprise

SSO, retention, enforced sharing/API controls, participant notification, and organization training defaults require Enterprise; Granola documents SSO for organizations with at least 50 seats. There is no native password or MFA system—authentication delegates to Google, Microsoft, or Enterprise SSO. Notes and transcripts persist indefinitely unless deleted or covered by Enterprise retention, and admins do not get a one-click workspace export.

EvidenceGranola pricingGranola subscriptions and billingGranola security and data FAQ

Read AI

Core admin on Enterprise; advanced governance on Enterprise+

Retention, domain controls, SAML, and HIPAA-related capabilities are concentrated in Enterprise+. That plan currently carries a five-license minimum.

EvidenceRead AI pricingRead AI workspace sharing settingsRead AI workspace offboardingRead AI data handling

Granola

Multilingual transcription

Granola supports multiple languages, but it does not publish the same 100+ headline count as several rivals. Test switching, accents, and domain vocabulary on real calls.

EvidenceGranola transcription

Read AI

Read’s pricing page says 20+; its detail table says 16+

Read’s current pricing page uses “20+ languages” in the Free plan card but “16+ languages” in the detailed comparison table. The coverage is useful but materially narrower on paper than competitors advertising 75 or 100+; verify the language you need rather than relying on the headline count.

EvidenceRead AI pricing