I used to be the person who typed notes during meetings and missed half of what was said. I’d look down to capture a decision, look up, and realize the conversation had moved on without me. After the call, I’d spend another 15 minutes cleaning up my notes into something readable and still miss context.

AI note takers fixed that for me about two years ago. But the market has changed fast since then. Some tools got better. Some got more expensive. And in 2026, how a tool records your meetings matters almost as much as the notes it produces, because Google Meet, Zoom, and Teams are all cracking down on bots that join calls uninvited.

I’ve been testing AI note takers since 2024. These are the four I’d recommend right now, based on real use in Zoom, Google Meet, and Teams calls over the past several months.

1) Krisp: Best AI Note Taker Overall

Krisp wasn’t originally a note taker. It started as a noise cancellation app, and that’s still what makes it different from everything else on this list.

The AI note taker captures audio through Krisp’s desktop app. No bot joins your meeting, no notification tells participants you’re recording. It runs in the background on your machine and works with Zoom, Google Meet, Teams, Slack, and pretty much any app that uses audio. After the call, you get a full transcript (16+ languages), an AI summary with decisions and next steps, and action items tagged to the people responsible.

Here’s what other note takers can’t do: Krisp cleans up the audio before it transcribes. The noise cancellation runs bidirectionally, removing background noise from your mic and from what you hear. That means the AI is working with cleaner audio from the start, and cleaner audio means more accurate transcripts. I’ve tested this in noisy environments where other tools produced garbled transcripts, and Krisp got the words right because it was filtering the noise out in real time.

There’s also accent conversion, which adjusts pronunciation so distributed teams follow each other more easily on calls. I work with teams across three time zones and this has cut down on “sorry, can you repeat that?” moments.

Krisp processes everything on your device. It’s GDPR compliant, SOC 2 Type II certified, doesn’t use your data to train models, and offers HIPAA compliance for enterprise teams. In a year when data privacy lawsuits are hitting other AI meeting tools, that on-device processing is a real advantage.

Pricing: 7-day free trial with full features. Pro plan at $8/month per user (billed annually). Business plan at $15/month per user adds CRM integrations (Salesforce, HubSpot), SSO, and manager views.

2) Otter AI: Established but Bot-Dependent

Otter was one of the first AI note takers to go mainstream, and it’s still a solid option for teams that work primarily in English. Its OtterPilot bot joins your Zoom, Google Meet, or Teams calls automatically through calendar sync, transcribes in real time, identifies speakers, and captures slide screenshots during presentations.

The transcription quality is good in clear audio with English speech. Otter also has an AI chat feature that lets you ask questions about past meetings, which is handy when you need to dig up a specific decision from weeks ago.

The downsides are real. OtterPilot joins as a visible bot, which means everyone in the meeting knows they’re being recorded. That’s fine for internal standups but awkward in client calls and sales conversations. Language support covers 6 languages (English, French, Spanish, German, Japanese, Chinese Simplified), far fewer than Krisp’s 16+ or Fireflies’ 100+. And the free plan caps you at 300 minutes per month with a 30-minute-per-conversation limit, which runs out fast.

Otter is also at the center of a federal class action lawsuit (Brewer v. Otter.ai, filed August 2025) alleging that its bot records non-users without consent and uses meeting data for AI training. Worth knowing if compliance matters to your team.

Pricing: Free plan with 300 minutes/month (30 min per conversation). Pro at $16.99/month ($8.49/month billed annually) with 1,200 minutes. Business at $30/month ($24/month billed annually) with unlimited meetings.

3) Fireflies: Powerful Search, Complex Pricing

Fireflies has leaned hard into making your meeting archive searchable. Its AI bot (named Fred) joins calls, transcribes them, and builds a database you can search by keyword, speaker, topic, or sentiment. If your team runs 50+ meetings a week and needs to find specific conversations later, that search functionality is where Fireflies earns its keep.

It supports transcription in 100+ languages, which gives it the widest language coverage on this list. There’s also an AI assistant called “Talk to Fireflies” that lets you ask questions during meetings and get answers from the web, powered by Perplexity AI.

But Fireflies uses a bot that joins your calls, and in 2026, that’s becoming a liability. Google Meet now flags these bots as potential risks and blocks them by default. Pricing also gets complicated. The paid plans use an AI credits system for summaries, action items, and the AI assistant. Each plan comes with a fixed credit pool, and once those run out, additional credits cost roughly $0.10 each. The sticker price of $10/month for Pro doesn’t tell the full story.

Pricing: Free plan with unlimited transcription but limited AI summaries (800 min storage). Pro at $18/month ($10/month billed annually). Business at $29/month ($19/month billed annually). Enterprise at $39/month billed annually.

4) Fathom: Generous Free Tier, Still Catching Up

Fathom’s free plan is the most generous I’ve found. You get unlimited recordings and transcriptions, with AI summaries for up to 5 calls per month. For someone who takes 3-4 important calls a week and only needs summaries for the big ones, that could be enough without paying anything.

Fathom originally used a bot to join meetings, but they’ve recently launched a bot-free recording option that captures audio from your device. It’s still in beta, so it’s not as polished as Krisp’s on-device recording, but it works. The summaries break out decisions, action items, and key topics clearly, and the clip feature lets you pull highlights from calls to share with your team.

Where Fathom falls short is pricing once you move past the free tier. Premium runs $20/month ($16/month annual), and the Team plan starts at $19/user/month ($15/user/month annual). There’s no noise cancellation or audio cleanup, so if you’re in a noisy environment, your transcripts will reflect that.

Pricing: Free plan with unlimited recordings (AI summaries capped at 5/month). Premium at $20/month ($16/month billed annually). Team at $19/user/month ($15/user/month billed annually). Business at $34/user/month ($25/user/month billed annually).

Which AI Note Taker Is Right for You?

Otter works for English-speaking teams who don’t mind a bot in their meetings and want a mature, searchable archive. Fireflies is built for teams drowning in meetings who need powerful search, though the bot and credit system add friction. Fathom is the best free option for individuals who don’t need AI summaries on every call.

But the note taker I keep coming back to is Krisp. The noise cancellation feeds directly into better transcription accuracy, the bot-free recording means nobody in your meeting gets surprised, and the AI note taker handles summaries and action items without a separate subscription. It does more with less friction than anything else I’ve tested.