Otter.aivs
Fireflies.ai
Both join your meetings and produce a transcript, summary and action items at a similar price. Otter is the simpler tool with better speaker identification. Fireflies assumes the meeting data is going somewhere — usually a CRM — and is built around that.
Published · updated
The short answer
- You want accurate notes and nothing else → Otter
- Meetings feed sales or customer success processes → Fireflies
- Recording bots are the problem, not the transcript → look at Granola instead
Side by side
| Otter.ai | Fireflies.ai | |
|---|---|---|
| Individual price | $16.99/mo (Pro) | From $10/seat/mo |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Speaker identification | Class leading | Strong |
| Meeting platforms | Zoom, Meet, Teams | Zoom, Meet, Teams |
| CRM integration | Salesforce and others | Salesforce, HubSpot, central to the product |
| Topic extraction | Basic | Strong |
| Speaker analytics | Limited | Talk-time analysis per person |
| Compliance | SOC 2 on Business | SOC 2 Type II on Business and above |
| Japanese | Usable, improving | Usable |
Highlighted cells mark where one is clearly ahead on that row. Pricing and specifications come from published vendor information and change without notice.
Who wins what
Individuals and small teams
Otter
Simpler to set up and live with, and speaker identification is a step ahead in multi-person meetings.
Sales and customer success
Fireflies
CRM sync and topic extraction connect meetings to the process rather than leaving transcripts in a folder.
Cost at team scale
Fireflies
From $10 per seat against Otter's $16.99 for an individual plan.
Coaching and call review
Fireflies
Per-speaker talk-time analysis is the feature managers actually use.
Strengths and trade-offs
Otter.ai
Strengths
- Best speaker identification of the two
- Native integration with Zoom, Meet and Teams
- Simple enough that people actually keep using it
- SOC 2 and SSO on Business plans
Trade-offs
- CRM integration is thinner
- Topic extraction and analytics are basic
- More expensive than Fireflies per seat
Fireflies.ai
Strengths
- CRM integration designed in, not bolted on
- Topic extraction and speaker analytics
- From $10 per seat
- SOC 2 Type II and custom retention on higher plans
Trade-offs
- More to configure than an individual needs
- Speaker identification trails Otter slightly
- Value depends on actually using the CRM integration
What it costs
For one person, Otter Pro at $16.99 against Fireflies from $10 per seat. At ten seats the gap is meaningful, and Fireflies gives you more for less — provided the CRM features are something you will use.
Which one, for who you are
Individual professional
Otter
Wants reliable notes from their own meetings
Simpler, and the speaker identification is better where it matters.
Sales organisation
Fireflies
Calls must reach Salesforce or HubSpot
That integration is the entire reason to buy a meeting tool at team scale.
Startup of 10 to 30
Fireflies
Cost matters, process is forming
Cheaper per seat with room to grow into the process features.
Executive or consultant
Neither — consider Granola
Confidential meetings, no bots
Neither of these solves the problem of a recorder joining the call.
Questions we get
- How accurate is Japanese transcription?
- Both are usable for one-to-one and small meetings and degrade as participants increase. If Japanese accuracy is the single deciding factor, evaluate Notta or CLOVA Note alongside them.
- Do they join meetings automatically?
- Yes, both connect to the calendar and send a bot into scheduled calls. If having a visible recorder in the meeting is a problem, Granola takes a different approach entirely.
- Which clears a security review more easily?
- Fireflies, with SOC 2 Type II and configurable retention on business plans. Otter has SOC 2 on Business as well, so the gap is narrower than it used to be.