Best AI Meeting Assistants
Never take meeting notes again—AI captures everything so you can focus on the conversation
By Toolradar Editorial Team · Updated
Otter.ai offers the best transcription accuracy with good free tier. Fireflies.ai provides excellent CRM integration for sales teams. Grain excels at creating shareable highlight clips. Fathom is excellent and free for individuals. Choose based on whether you need simple transcription or team-wide meeting intelligence.
AI meeting assistants have transformed how teams capture conversations. Instead of someone scrambling to take notes, AI joins your call, transcribes everything, identifies key points, and creates searchable records. The technology has matured rapidly—transcription accuracy rivals human note-takers. Here's how to choose the right tool for your meeting workflow.
What are AI Meeting Assistants?
AI meeting assistants record, transcribe, and analyze meetings automatically. They join video calls (Zoom, Meet, Teams) as a participant or integrate directly, capture audio, generate real-time transcripts, identify speakers, and increasingly use AI to extract action items, summaries, and key moments. Some integrate with CRMs to log sales calls automatically.
Why AI Meeting Assistants Matter
Meetings are information-dense but poorly captured. Manual notes miss details. Memory fades. Important decisions get lost. AI assistants create perfect records: searchable transcripts, automatic summaries, and the ability to review exactly what was said. For sales teams, this means every call can be analyzed for coaching and CRM data capture.
Key Features to Look For
Join and record meetings without manual intervention
High-quality speech-to-text with speaker identification
Automatic extraction of key points and action items
Search across meetings and create shareable highlights
Push meeting notes and data to Salesforce, HubSpot, etc.
Share and collaborate on meeting notes with teammates
Support for languages beyond English
Teach the AI your company's specific terminology
Key Factors to Consider
Evaluation Checklist
Pricing Overview
Fathom (unlimited free), Otter.ai (300 min/mo), Fireflies.ai (800 min storage)
Otter.ai Pro $16.99/mo, Fireflies.ai Pro $18/mo, Grain Business $19/mo
Otter.ai Business $30/mo, Fireflies.ai Business $29/mo, Enterprise $39/mo
Top Picks
Based on features, user feedback, and value for money.
Individual professionals and teams wanting the most accurate transcription
Sales teams wanting AI-powered meeting analysis with automatic CRM logging
Product and UX teams wanting to share specific customer feedback moments
Mistakes to Avoid
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Recording without explicit consent — In two-party consent states (California, Illinois, etc.) and many EU countries, all participants must agree. Most bots announce themselves, but verify your tool does. Fines can be $5,000+ per violation
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Trusting AI summaries without review — AI summaries miss context, misattribute statements, and sometimes hallucinate. For important meetings (client calls, legal discussions), always review the transcript before sharing the summary
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Over-recording everything — Not every standup, 1-on-1, or casual chat needs a permanent record. Set calendar rules to auto-record external calls and skip internal informals. Recording everything creates data noise and privacy concerns
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Ignoring data privacy implications — Your meeting transcripts contain sensitive business information. Verify: where is data stored? Who at the vendor can access it? What's the retention policy? SOC 2 compliance matters for enterprise use
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Relying on transcripts instead of paying attention — The best use of meeting AI is capturing details you'd miss while being fully engaged in conversation, not as an excuse to multitask. Participants notice when you're not present
Expert Tips
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Use Fathom (free) for individual meeting notes — Fathom is completely free with unlimited meetings, AI summaries, and action items. It's the best starting point before investing in team tools. No bot visible to participants
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Set up CRM auto-logging for sales calls — Fireflies.ai pushes structured data (next steps, competitor mentions, pricing discussed) to Salesforce/HubSpot automatically. This saves sales reps 15-30 minutes/day of manual CRM entry
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Create a customer voice library with Grain — Product teams that share timestamped customer clips in Slack see faster feature prioritization than those sharing written summaries. A 30-second clip of a frustrated customer is more persuasive than a paragraph
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Use transcripts for precise follow-up emails — Quote exact phrases from the meeting in your follow-up: 'You mentioned X was a priority for Q2.' This builds trust and shows you were listening. Otter and Fireflies both support keyword search across meetings
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Configure calendar-based auto-recording — Set rules like 'record all meetings with external participants' and 'skip all recurring team standups.' This prevents recording fatigue while capturing important conversations automatically
Red Flags to Watch For
- !Bot joins meetings without visual/audio announcement—participants feel surveilled, and in some jurisdictions this violates recording consent laws
- !Transcripts stored only on vendor servers with no export option—if you cancel, you lose all your meeting history
- !Free tier has very short storage retention (30-60 days)—important meeting records disappear if you don't upgrade in time
- !CRM integration only available on enterprise tier ($39+/seat/month)—if your primary use case is sales call logging, the entry price is misleading
The Bottom Line
Fathom (free) is the clear starting point for individuals—unlimited meeting notes with no cost and no visible bot. Otter.ai ($16.99/user/month Pro) offers the best transcription accuracy for teams wanting reliable records. Fireflies.ai ($18/seat/month Pro) is ideal for sales teams needing CRM integration and conversation intelligence. Grain ($19/user/month) excels when product and UX teams need to share specific customer feedback moments as clips.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is it legal to record meetings with AI?
Recording laws vary by location—some require all-party consent, others single-party. Most platforms can announce themselves when joining. Always inform participants that recording is happening, both for legal compliance and professional courtesy.
How accurate are AI transcriptions?
Modern tools achieve 85-95% accuracy for clear audio in English. Accuracy drops with: multiple speakers talking over each other, heavy accents, poor audio quality, and technical jargon. Always review important transcripts.
Do the bots joining calls annoy participants?
They can—especially in external meetings. Most tools let you record without a visible bot (through calendar integration), though this varies by video platform. For important external calls, consider using integrated recording instead of bot-based.
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