Otter.ai vs Fireflies.ai: Meeting Transcription Comparison

At a glance

Otter.ai and Fireflies.ai both capture meetings and create summaries, but they differ in language coverage, free plan permanence, and transcription limits. Otter focuses on meeting workflows with tiered transcription allowances, while Fireflies emphasizes unlimited transcription across all paid plans and support for over 100 languages.

	Otter.ai	Fireflies.ai
Best for	Teams needing real-time meeting notes and business integrations	Organizations wanting unlimited transcription and multilingual support
Free plan	300 monthly minutes, 3 lifetime file imports	Unlimited transcription, unlimited summaries (permanent)
Starting price	$8.33 per user per month (Pro, annual)	$10 per seat per month (Pro, annual)
Languages supported	6 (English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, Chinese)	100+ with auto-detection
Max concurrent meetings	Up to 3 (Business tier)	Up to 3 (Business tier)
Integrations	Salesforce, HubSpot, Zapier, Gmail, Google Drive, Notion, Jira	240+ integrations
Recording limit per meeting	90 mins (Pro), 4 hours (Business)	2 hours (Free/Pro), 3 hours (Business), 4 hours (Enterprise)

Otter.ai: strengths and limits

Otter.ai centers on meeting workflows and team collaboration. The platform automatically joins Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet to transcribe meetings in real time. It identifies speakers by name and supports taggable speakers on paid tiers.

The product connects with business tools including Salesforce, HubSpot, Zapier, Gmail, Google Drive, Notion, and Jira. Advanced features such as custom AI workflows and Otter Sales Notetaker are available on Business and Enterprise plans. The platform offers video replay for Zoom and Google Meet recordings and includes an AI Chat feature for asking questions across captured meetings.

Otter’s primary limitation is language support. The platform transcribes in only six languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, and Chinese. This restricts usefulness for organizations with multilingual meeting needs.

The free Basic plan has significant constraints for regular users. It includes only 300 monthly transcription minutes with a 30-minute cap per conversation. Users can import three audio or video files in their lifetime. Monthly transcription minutes reset each month, but file imports do not. Upgrading to paid plans means choosing between Pro (1,200 monthly minutes, 90 minutes per meeting) or Business (unlimited recordings, 4 hours per meeting).

Fireflies.ai: strengths and limits

Fireflies.ai makes unlimited transcription a core feature across all plans, including the free tier. The platform transcribes in 100+ languages with automatic language detection. According to the company, accuracy reaches 99% for English and 95% for other languages.

Every Fireflies user receives unlimited AI summaries regardless of plan level. The platform includes AskFred, an AI assistant that answers questions about meetings using natural language. For example, users can ask “What did the client say about pricing?” and retrieve answers from transcribed meetings. AskFred is available on all plans with AI credit limits varying by tier.

Fireflies offers 240+ integrations across team tools, CRM systems, and workflow platforms. The platform supports recording on Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, and additional services through its Chrome extension. Video recording limits increase with plan tier: 2 hours for Free and Pro, 3 hours for Business, and 4 hours for Enterprise.

The free plan never expires and maintains all core features. Users receive unlimited transcription and unlimited AI summaries permanently, though storage is limited to 400 minutes per team. This differs from Otter, whose free plan has rolling monthly transcription limits that reset.

Fireflies’ main trade-off is storage allocation. Free users share 400 minutes of storage across the entire team. Pro users get 8,000 minutes per seat, while Business and Enterprise users receive unlimited storage. Teams with high meeting volume or lengthy recordings may reach storage constraints on lower tiers.

Price and plans

Otter.ai offers monthly and annual billing options. The Pro plan costs $16.99 per user per month on a monthly basis or $8.33 per user per month when billed annually. The Business plan costs $30 per user per month monthly or $19.99 per user per month annually. Enterprise pricing is custom and requires contacting sales. Otter also provides a 7-day Business Trial at no cost.

Fireflies.ai uses annual and monthly billing models. Pro costs $10 per seat per month when billed annually or $18 per seat per month monthly. Business costs $19 per seat per month annually or $29 per seat per month monthly. Enterprise costs $39 per seat per month and is available for annual billing only. According to Fireflies, annual billing saves up to 44% compared to monthly plans.

Both platforms charge per user or seat for team plans. Otter’s Basic tier is free permanently, and Fireflies’ Free tier also has no expiration. The pricing gap between Otter Pro ($8.33 annually) and Fireflies Pro ($10 annually) is small, but Fireflies includes unlimited transcription while Otter caps Pro at 1,200 monthly minutes.

Which one should you choose

Choose Otter.ai if your team operates primarily in English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, or Chinese and you need real-time collaborative editing during meetings. Otter excels in meeting workflows, custom AI summaries, and connections with CRM systems like Salesforce and HubSpot. For teams of 5 or fewer people, the free Basic plan offers a starting point, though the 300-minute monthly limit will be exhausted quickly with regular usage.

Choose Fireflies.ai if your organization holds meetings across multiple languages, needs permanent access to a free transcription tool, or values unlimited transcription on paid plans. Fireflies suits teams that want to search across all recorded meetings without tracking monthly transcription quotas. The 100+ language support makes Fireflies more suitable for global teams. If your priority is low-cost access while maintaining unlimited meeting capture, Fireflies’ free plan is permanent and does not downgrade to a trial.

Both platforms support the same meeting services (Zoom, Teams, Google Meet) and provide mobile and desktop apps. If integrations are your deciding factor, Fireflies’ 240+ integrations likely cover more existing tools, but Otter’s Salesforce and HubSpot connectivity may be more important if you rely heavily on those systems.

Common questions

Can I use these tools without joining meetings live?

Both Otter and Fireflies allow you to upload audio and video files for transcription after meetings conclude. Otter permits 3 lifetime file imports on the Basic plan and 10 monthly imports on Pro. Fireflies allows file uploads on all tiers without per-upload limits, though storage limits may apply depending on your plan.

Which tool has better accuracy?

Third-party sources report that Fireflies achieves 94.2% word-level accuracy and Otter achieves 93.8%, a difference described as negligible. Both tools struggle with heavy accents and overlapping speech. Fireflies reports 95% accuracy for non-English languages according to the company documentation.

Do these tools work offline or locally?

Neither tool offers local, offline transcription. Both require internet connectivity to capture and process meetings. Otter provides a desktop app and Chrome extension, and Fireflies offers a Chrome extension and desktop app, but transcription processing occurs in the cloud on both platforms.

The conclusion

Otter.ai and Fireflies.ai address the same core need: capturing and summarizing meetings without manual note-taking. They differ most significantly in language breadth, free plan design, and transcription allowances.

Otter’s strength lies in meeting workflows and business integrations. If your team operates in a single language and values real-time editing and CRM connections, Otter delivers. The free plan works for occasional use but becomes limiting for daily meeting capture.

Fireflies’ strength is permanent free access to unlimited transcription and support for 100+ languages. For globally distributed teams or organizations that need to preserve every meeting without hitting monthly caps, Fireflies’ pricing model is more straightforward and permissive.

Both tools record meetings automatically, generate summaries with action items, and enable searching across meeting history. Your choice depends on language requirements, expected meeting volume, and integration needs. Test the free tiers first, then measure against your actual monthly transcription minutes to determine which pricing structure aligns with your workflow.

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