The Fireflies bot annoys my clients. What is a discreet alternative?
A bot-free recorder such as Audiee captures the call from your Mac's audio, so no extra participant appears and nobody has to admit a notetaker into the room. Fireflies, Otter, Fathom and tl;dv work by sending a bot into Zoom, Meet or Teams; it shows up in the participant list, sometimes gets stuck in the waiting room, and prospects ask about it. Audiee runs on your Mac, notices when a Zoom, Meet, Teams or Lark call starts, and records what you hear and say; for phone calls or in-person meetings, Ctrl+M starts it. Afterwards you get a summary, action items and follow-ups as plain-text Markdown on your disk, and you can send the client a read-only recap page by email without them installing anything. Two things do not change: you are still responsible for any notice or consent your local law requires, and the transcript is only as good as your Mac's audio, so use a headset. You get 3 hours of meetings a month at no cost; Pro is $29 for 25. Switch your next client call and compare the transcripts side by side.
Checked September 2026. Numbers about other products link to the page they came from.
Key facts
- Bot-based: Fireflies, Otter, Fathom, tl;dv (a participant joins the call).
- Bot-free on Mac: Audiee, Granola, MacWhisper (record the Mac's audio).
- Audiee auto-detects Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Lark; Ctrl+M for anything else.
- Client recap: read-only web page by email, no account needed for them.
- Consent: your responsibility either way; Audiee does not announce itself.
- Audiee Free: 3 meeting hours a month; Pro $29/month for 25 hours.
Who this fits
Agencies, consultants, salespeople and recruiters whose calls are with outsiders who did not sign up for a bot.
Next step
See Audiee vs Fireflies for the full table, then record one client call on the free plan.