Otter.ai

Otter.ai is the pioneer of AI meeting transcription and remains one of the most widely used meeting assistants. It provides live, real-time captions during meetings and generates structured summaries the moment a call ends.

The free tier gives 300 minutes of transcription per month and basic AI features. Pro ($10/mo) increases to 1,200 minutes and adds AI summaries, custom vocabulary, and advanced exports. Business ($20/user/mo) adds team features, admin controls, and priority support.

Otter’s OtterPilot feature joins meetings on your behalf, takes notes, and answers questions from attendees using your past meeting context. The AI Chat feature lets you ask questions about any past meeting in natural language — useful for searching across months of meeting history. Otter also integrates with Salesforce, HubSpot, Slack, and major video conferencing platforms.

A key differentiator is real-time transcription quality: Otter shows live text during meetings (not just after), which is invaluable for accessibility and for catching specifics during fast-moving calls.

Pros: Best real-time live transcription, mature and reliable product, good Salesforce/HubSpot integrations, solid free tier, wide platform support.
Cons: Less intelligent summaries than Fathom, meeting history search less powerful than Fireflies, video recording requires higher plan.

Best for: Professionals with hearing difficulties, sales reps needing CRM sync, and teams who want reliable, real-time meeting transcription.