Best local AI meeting notes for Mac
Short answer: if you want meeting notes that stay on your Mac and become a memory you can search — in English, Mandarin or Cantonese — Audiee.ai is the one built for that. If you want the prettiest single-meeting notes, Granola. If you need a team archive with CRM sync and don't mind a bot in the call, Fireflies or Otter. If you only need offline transcription of files, MacWhisper.
We make Audiee.ai, so read this as a maker's honest map, not a neutral review. Facts about other tools were checked in September 2026 on their own sites; prices are the entry paid tier and change often.
How we judged
- Where the notes live — on your machine, or in the vendor's cloud.
- Whether a bot joins — bots are visible to everyone on the call and need explaining.
- Languages — especially mixed Chinese and English in one sentence, which most tools break on, and the South-East Asian languages most tools skip (Thai, Indonesian, Malay, Filipino).
- Memory — does the tool remember across meetings and answer questions, or stop at a recap?
- The rest of the day — dictation, screenshots, to-dos; a meeting tool that only works during meetings is a small tool.
| Tool | Platform | Notes live | Bot joins | Languages | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Audiee.ai | macOS | On your Mac (Markdown) | No | EN · 中文 · 粤语 mixed · VI TH ID MS TL | Free 3 h/mo · Pro $19 |
| Granola | macOS, Windows | Granola cloud | No | EN + European · VI | Free · paid ~$18 |
| Otter | Web, iOS, Android | Otter cloud | Yes | EN, ES, FR | Free · Pro ~$17 |
| Fireflies | Web + bot, mobile | Fireflies cloud | Yes | 60+ | Free · Pro ~$18 |
| Fathom | Desktop + bot | Fathom cloud | Yes | EN + major | Free · Premium ~$19 |
| tl;dv | Desktop + bot | tl;dv cloud | Yes | 30+ | Free · Pro ~$18 |
| Notion AI Meeting Notes | Notion apps | Notion cloud | No | EN + major | Part of Notion AI |
| MacWhisper | macOS | On your Mac | No | Many (Whisper) | Free · Pro one-time |
| Krisp | macOS, Windows | Krisp cloud | No | EN + major | Free · Pro ~$8 |
| Epilude | macOS (Local Mode: Apple silicon, 16 GB) | On your Mac (Markdown) | No | 30+ in Cloud mode | $59 once · Pro ~$18 |
Audiee.ai
The only one here that turns meetings, voice notes and screenshots into a local memory you can ask, in English, Mandarin and Cantonese — and the only one with Thai, Indonesian, Malay and Filipino. No bot. Newer than the others; Mac only; no video.
Granola
The best-written single-meeting notes and a lovely editor. Notes live in Granola's cloud; memory across meetings is basic.
Otter
Mature, mobile-first, team workspaces. A bot joins your calls and everything lives in Otter's cloud.
Fireflies
Team archive with CRM and Slack integrations, wide language list. Bot-based; cloud-only.
Fathom
Generous free recorder with video clips. Built around the recap of one call.
tl;dv
Recording plus multi-meeting reports for sales and CS teams. Bot-based.
Notion AI Meeting Notes
Great if your team already lives in Notion; notes land next to your docs. Not local, not bilingual-Chinese.
MacWhisper
Excellent fully-offline transcription of files and system audio. A transcriber, not a notetaker: no summaries, memory or meeting detection.
Krisp
Noise cancellation first, with meeting notes bolted on. Good if audio quality is your main problem.
Epilude
Dictation-first app with a notetaker added in August 2026; its Local Mode runs on-device models, so audio never leaves. Pay once. No cross-meeting memory or MCP; needs a recent Apple silicon Mac for local processing.
The verdict
Most of these are cloud recorders with a summary on top; they differ in polish and team features. Three keep notes on your Mac: MacWhisper (offline transcription only), Epilude (on-device dictation and per-meeting notes, Apple silicon only) and Audiee.ai (transcription in the cloud, then summaries, a knowledge base and an assistant on your Mac). If "my notes should stay mine" and "I speak Chinese and English" are on your list, that narrows it to one.
Try Audiee.ai free — 3 hours of transcription a month (meetings and dictation together), no card. Bring your own comparison; we'd rather you check than believe us.