04.08.2026
20 min
7 Best tl;dv Alternatives in 2026 (Compared and Ranked)
By Sanduni
Growth Content Editor
The best tl;dv alternatives in 2026 will be determined by why you started searching.
- Perhaps the limit on the number of meetings you get free summaries for has run out at 10, so now only the first ten minutes of each meeting gets summarized.
- Perhaps meeting bots keep joining all of your virtual meetings, and you have already looked into ways to remove it.
- Possibly you simply want a simple answer to one question: is the data collected from my meetings safe?
- And possibly you want more than 30 languages, or notes from the in-person meetings that tl;dv is not designed to provide.
Regardless of what drew you to this guide, we compared the seven strongest tl;dv alternatives on the basis of cost, privacy, language support, and what each does best, starting with Jamie, Fathom, Otter, Fireflies, Avoma, Granola, and Grain.
Want meeting notes without an AI credit counter or a ten-minute cutoff?
Jamie eliminates manual note taking, and provides Ask AI, summaries and templates without per-use AI credits.
What are the best TLDV alternatives in 2026?
Based on my research and experience, the best tl;dv alternatives in 2026 are Jamie, Fathom, Otter, Fireflies, Avoma, Granola, and Grain.
For a quick side-by-side of all seven, let's start with a full comparison table below. It gives you the summary at a glance, and you can expand each cell if you want the detail behind any yes or no answer; just click to open it.
1. Jamie
Jamie is an AI note-taker and meeting recorder available on Mac, Windows, Web, iOS, and Android. Jamie is designed to record calls using your own device, so no bot joins or participates in the call.
In addition to creating speaker-labeled notes through automatic transcription, Jamie creates premium-quality AI-generated meeting summaries, and Task detection extracts the decisions and action items on every plan, including free.
Jamie can be used both in person and remotely in over 100 different languages, and Ask AI (chat) lets you ask any question about any past meeting. No per-use AI credits are required for any of it. Let's look at what makes Jamie the best TLDV alternative compared to its key features.
Jamie runs unlimited Ask AI with no per-use AI credits on any plan
Jamie does not use a per-use AI credit system on any plan. On the free plan, Jamie gives you 10 full-length meetings a month, each up to 30 minutes long. Every single meeting comes with a full summary, transcript, and unlimited Ask AI, with no AI usage credits applied on top.
To be fair here: there are no limits on how many recordings or transcripts you can make on tl;dv's free tier, where Jamie's free plan gives you ten. But the AI is where tl;dv runs out. Your first 10 meetings get full AI notes, then only the first 10 minutes of each meeting is summarized, and those limits last the lifetime of the account; they never come back.
tl;dv also meters the AI itself, using something it calls AI credits. On the free plan they are limited, covering your AI meeting notes, AI prompts, AI Reports, and the integrations you trigger. This is a lifetime limit, not one credit per month: you get 10 AI prompts for the lifetime of the account.
Jamie never meters the AI. Our only credits are meeting credits, and Ask AI, summaries, templates, and integrations never cost one. You can use Ask AI as much as you like during that same month and every month after, without running out of credits.
In Jamie's free plan, you receive 10 full-length meetings a month, up to 30 minutes each. Every meeting includes a complete transcript, premium summaries, action items, and unlimited Ask AI. Nothing is limited to 10 minutes.
Ask AI is also completely unlimited on every single plan, including free. Ask as many questions across multiple meetings as you like, and create as much content from them as you want.
No credit is charged, and there are no limits. tl;dv's free plan offers a similar feature, but it caps how many AI prompts you can use for creating content. You are capped at 10 for the lifetime of your account, and once they are used up, they are gone.
Ask AI simply keeps going, with no counter to watch. tl;dv also limits its multi-meeting intelligence to 5 queries on Free and Pro, and only makes it unlimited on Business and above.
Credit where it is due though: tl;dv gives every plan global transcript search, so a searchable meeting library with advanced search is there from the free tier.
Action items, transcripts, summaries, and templates do not charge a credit. Run a summary again, or switch between templates as many times as you want, and no credit is charged with Jamie. The free plan allows one custom template, and Pro and up give you unlimited custom templates.
As for integrations, they do not burn a credit either. With the free plan, you can send your notes to Google Docs, Notion, and OneNote, and sync as many times as you want. The paid plans open up the full lineup, around a dozen integrations in total, including Salesforce, HubSpot, Dynamics 365, Attio and Asana, along with Claude and ChatGPT through MCP and Jamie's own API and webhooks.
Your action items travel with them too, not just the notes, so tasks land where your team already works.
Your notes also stay put. Jamie keeps your transcripts and notes with unlimited retention on every plan, which matters especially for teams comparing European AI meeting assistants with strong privacy and GDPR compliance. On tl;dv's free plan, recordings move to archived storage and are kept only up to three months.
Jamie holds ISO 27001 certification and is DORA compliant
Jamie holds its own ISO 27001 certification and is DORA compliant, on top of GDPR, and Jamie also performs both storage and processing within Europe (the EEA, Switzerland, and the UK) on every plan including free.
Short answer: yes, tl;dv is safe and GDPR compliant. tldx Solutions GmbH is a European company that stores data in Europe and is SOC 2 Type II certified and compliant with the EU AI Act. They say they do not train AI using your data. A full tl;dv review of features, pricing, and limitations gives more context on how that security posture fits day-to-day use. Both tools are solid on all of that and tl;dv deserves credit for this. Where they differ is whose names the certifications appear under.
Here is where that gets specific. On tl;dv's own security page, the ISO 27001 line is about its data centers: Google, AWS, and Hetzner are the ones certified. This is a standard process for running a product, however, it is good to know what this covers.
A data center certification verifies that the physical locations where your data resides, the buildings and servers, are secure. It does not verify how the company as a whole protects your data, whether there are specific individuals on the team who can access your recorded sessions, or what happens when something goes wrong.
That distinction costs you time the moment someone asks you to prove it. That may be your IT department, your client or your investor asking for documentation in the vendor's own name. For a deal team, or anyone working under financial regulation, that time goes into vendor security reviews and third party risk questionnaires.
Those are questions about the companies that you purchase from, not the data centers they rent, and DORA holds financial institutions accountable for the technology vendors they rely upon.
Jamie goes further on the specifics that regulated and enterprise teams inquire about by name:
- ISO 27001 certified, the international standard for information security management.
- DORA compliant, which speaks to the requirements financial institutions place on their vendors' use of technology. tl;dv has not referenced DORA compliance.
- Deletes your meeting audio once Jamie has transcribed it.
- Shared workspace, tags and collaboration features on Team and Enterprise, so a deal team can collaborate from one space, one library of all the meetings tied to a particular deal.
- User analytics on Enterprise, so admins get visibility into actual usage of Jamie.
Jamie records without a bot on any meeting platform
The difference is that Jamie is an app native to your own device. Nothing is ever added to your meeting, so no participant sees a bot, and Jamie can capture conversations across popular video conferencing tools on any meeting platform.
You may know how frustrating it is to try to remove the tl;dv bot from a Google Meet call, which is why many teams now look specifically for bot-free note-takers for Google Meet. That is exactly what happens with the standard configuration tl;dv offers: a bot is sent into your call as a participant. tl;dv does offer a desktop application that records the system audio from your computer, but that is a different mode you have to opt into, rather than the default.
Since Jamie does not send a bot into the call, your call remains a normal conversation between you and the people you are meeting with, while Jamie handles the meeting notes.
tl;dv even offers Custom bot appearance on Pro and above, so on a paid plan you can add some style to the bot that joins your call. Jamie has no bot to style, because none joins your call. Your meeting stays a conversation between people, and Jamie works quietly behind the scenes from your own device.
Jamie's Recording notice emails attendees 24 hours before the meeting
Jamie was developed around the concept of consent first, and that makes transparency much easier. By switching on the Recording notice, Jamie will email your attendees 24 hours before the meeting to inform them that you are planning to take notes using Jamie. While you are still ultimately responsible for obtaining consent, Jamie helps make it simple to tell your attendees.
Jamie starts recording automatically with Auto-start recording and AutoStop
Jamie has automated how you record meetings. Jamie begins automatically the moment your calendar event starts, shows a countdown you can cancel with one click, and stops itself once the meeting goes quiet, so nothing depends on you remembering to press record:
- Auto-start recording: Jamie starts recording the moment your calendar meeting begins, with no clicks.
- Countdown before recording: A countdown appears first, so one click keeps a conversation off the record.
- AutoStop: Jamie notices when the meeting has gone quiet and stops the recording itself.
- Calendar reminders: Scheduled on your own device, so they still arrive on time even offline.
- Choose your lead time: Set how many minutes before a meeting Jamie reminds you.
Jamie transcribes in 100+ languages on every plan, including free
Jamie creates transcripts in over 100 languages, which gives global teams extensive language support.
tl;dv supports 30+ languages, which is more limited language support, and was designed specifically for online meetings on video conferencing platforms and meeting platforms like Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams. For teams comparing how those limits show up across plans, a detailed look at tl;dv pricing and whether it is worth it can help. Jamie covers the same 100+ languages on every platform, not just online calls.
Jamie also preserves the language each speaker actually spoke within the transcript, and summarizes the conversation in the language used most often (Dominant language). That applies on every plan, including the free one.
Jamie detects the spoken language automatically on every plan, including free. On tl;dv's pricing comparison table, automatic language detection and multi-language meetings are reserved for the Business plan and above, so a Free or Pro user gets neither of those two features. So if a call runs half in English and half in German, Jamie writes the notes in the language people actually spoke, without you telling it which one to use.
Jamie records in-person meetings on iPhone and Android
Jamie records in-person meetings on iPhone and Android too, not just online video calls. Meet a founder for coffee or visit a site, and Jamie writes the same notes, transcript and action items you get from a Zoom call, on every plan including free:
- iPhone and Android apps: Record in person, then read your notes and tasks on the move.
- Live Activities: Follow an active recording straight from your iPhone lock screen.
- Tasks on mobile: Create, view and filter your action items from your phone.
- In-person meetings: Included on every plan, including free.
Jamie transcribes with editable speaker labels, Custom vocabulary and Speaker Memory
Jamie's transcripts are speaker-labeled, time-stamped, and fully editable, and you can teach it the words your team actually uses.
Although tl;dv only offers its custom words dictionary on the Business plan and up, Jamie includes custom vocabulary in the free plan, covering company names, product terminology, and industry jargon, so there is no additional charge to unlock it.
Jamie handles editable transcripts, custom vocabulary, and speaker recognition:
- Editable transcripts and speaker labels, copy and paste freely, no paywall on your own words.
- Custom vocabulary so product names, client names, and industry terms come through right.
- Speaker identification with Speaker Memory: Jamie learns each person's voice, so the next time you meet them, it labels them for you automatically. When it is unsure, it hands you a short voice clip of each speaker to label in seconds.
Jamie recognizes speakers by voice print on every plan, including free
tl;dv puts AI voice identification (voice prints) on its paid plans, so free users do not get it at all. Jamie has had built in voice print speaker recognition from the start, on all plans including free. And it holds up: in our hands on test of leading AI note takers, Jamie scored 98 out of 100 for speaker identification and was the only tool tested to distinguish every voice and match the names correctly.
Improvements have been made to Jamie's diarization engine, the part that works out who is speaking, which handles accents, cross-talk, and quick turns by speakers. See the speaker identification test.
Jamie transcribes at premium quality on every plan, including free
Meeting transcription happens at the highest possible accuracy on every plan, including free. Jamie runs advanced speech-recognition models developed for real, messy meetings, accents, crosstalk, and fast talkers, and provides the same quality results to everybody, without any need to pay extra for a premium version. While tl;dv reserves premium transcription quality for its Business plan only.
Jamie's live transcription writes the text while people are still speaking, and the summary then streams in word by word as the meeting ends, so you get instant AI summaries instead of waiting on a loading screen.
With Jamie, quality is not a tier you buy:
- Premium transcript quality: Jamie's highest-accuracy transcription on every plan, including free.
- Live summary streaming: Your summary appears word by word as Jamie writes it.
- Speaker Diarization: Upgraded to handle accents, crosstalk and fast turn-taking.
- Automatic language detection: Jamie picks up the spoken language with no setup.
- Notes and transcripts in 100+ languages: Included on every plan, including free.
Jamie syncs meeting notes to Salesforce, HubSpot, Attio and Pipedrive
Jamie automatically sends meeting notes and action items into your CRM. For Pro and higher tier plans, native CRM integration works with Salesforce, HubSpot, Dynamics 365, Attio and Pipedrive. Jamie also syncs DealCloud on Team and Enterprise, and Affinity on Enterprise plans, so deal teams for private equity and venture capital keep customer data and customer interactions up to date without manual data entry:
- Salesforce: Notes and tasks attach to the matching record (Pro plan and up).
- HubSpot, Dynamics 365, Attio and Pipedrive: Native sync for the CRMs deal teams actually run (Pro plan and up).
- Automatic CRM sync and CRM automation: Switch it on once and every new meeting is pushed after processing.
- Tasks sync: Your action items travel with the notes, not just the summary.
- Google Docs, Notion and OneNote: Included on the free plan, sync as often as you like.
Jamie runs follow-up actions through Agent connectors, Skills, MCP and the REST API
Jamie does not just provide answers to questions about your meetings; Jamie also takes action. The Ask AI feature connects to Slack, Gmail, Notion, Linear, Attio and GitHub on Pro and higher, so notes reach the project management tools and project management platforms your team already uses, without using any credits based on usage:
- Agent connectors: The Ask AI feature can reach Slack, Gmail, Notion, Linear, Attio and GitHub (Pro plan and up).
- Skills: Save an instruction once, and Jamie runs it on request, with no credit cost.
- MCP: Open your meetings to Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot and Cursor (Pro plan and up).
- REST API and webhooks: Wire Jamie into your own workflows (Pro plan and up).
- No per-use AI credits: None of this is metered, on any plan.
Jamie pricing
Free: €0
- 10 AI meeting notes a month, each with a full transcript and speakers labeled automatically.
- Every meeting runs up to 30 minutes.
- Unlimited Ask AI, with no per-use credit.
- Automatic action items that detect who each one belongs to.
- 1 custom template, 50 custom vocabulary terms.
- Unlimited storage.
- Export to Google Docs, Notion, and OneNote.
- A recording-consent email Jamie can send participants 24 hours before the meeting.
- Data stays in Europe (EEA, Switzerland, UK) even on Free.
- ISO 27001 certified and DORA compliant, with SOC 2 Type II in progress.
- No bot joins your call.
- Works on every platform, online and in person, in 100+ languages.
Plus: €25
Everything in Free, plus:
- 20 AI meeting notes a month.
- Each meeting runs up to 2 hours.
- 3 custom templates.
- Still unlimited Ask AI, still unlimited storage, still no credits.
Pro: €47
Everything in Plus, plus:
- Unlimited AI meeting notes.
- Each meeting runs up to 3 hours.
- Unlimited custom templates.
- Native CRM and work-app sync (Salesforce, HubSpot, Dynamics 365, Attio, Pipedrive, Asana), manual or automatic, no credits.
- Advanced integrations and MCP: connect Ask AI to Slack, Gmail, Notion, Linear, GitHub, plus Claude, ChatGPT, and Copilot.
- Agent Skills, reusable AI instructions that run without a credit.
- A REST API and webhooks.
- Priority support.
Team: €39/seat
Everything in Pro, plus:
- Unlimited notes and transcripts up to 3 hours, per seat, at a lower per-seat price than Pro.
- 100 custom vocabulary terms.
- Shared templates and tags across your workspace.
- Team-share notifications.
- User management and admin controls.
Enterprise: Custom
Everything in Team, plus:
- SSO (SAML 2.0), enterprise security, and DPAs.
- Audit logs, Directory Sync, and SCIM.
- 250 custom vocabulary terms.
- Password-protected share links.
- A dedicated account manager, custom retention, and IP allowlist.
What real Jamie users say
What they love
- Bot-free capture, no awkward bot on the call.
"I like Jamie because it's a bot-free AI note-taker that can take notes without an awkward bot on the call." (G2)
- Accurate transcription and well-organized summaries.
"The transcription is also usually very accurate. I also like the AI summaries it generates after the call - they're well laid out and organized, especially compared to other AI note-takers." (G2)
- A lifesaver for multilingual meetings, even Hebrew.
"Finally an app that... Understands Hebrew. Jaime is also a life saver for: Multi lingual conversations [and] Offline and online meetings." (G2)
What they flag, and how Jamie handles it
- Mic setup needed a tweak early on, now fixed.
"I had an issue before with recording the meeting notes because my microphone or something was not set up properly. But the latest update now grabs the meeting sounds with no extra configuration." (G2)
The reviewer answered their own gripe: a later update made capture automatic, with no setup.
- Speaker identification isn't infallible.
"The speaker identification feature of Jamie, though very useful, isn't entirely reliable or infallible. In our experience, to get the most effective results from Jamie, it was necessary to invest in a good quality microphone." (G2)
When Jamie is unsure, it hands you a short voice clip of each speaker to label in seconds, and Speaker Memory remembers those voices for every future meeting.
- A few rough edges, it's still young.
"There a few buggy things and missing integrations but Jaime is young and I have full confidence in what their future looks like. It's better than every other app I've tried." (G2)
Even the critique ends as a recommendation, and Jamie ships new integrations and features constantly.
2. Fathom
Source: Fathom
Running out of room on the tl;dv free plan is usually what sends people looking, and Fathom is the next logical option. For some teams, it also sparks a broader search for Fathom AI alternatives and competitors. Fathom offers completely unlimited meeting recordings, transcription, and storage for free, which is almost unheard of. In 2026 Fathom also reduced the disparity in bot-free recording, though that functionality remains in beta at present.
Key Features
- Unlimited free recording and transcription: capture, transcribe, and store every call at no cost.
- AI summaries with action items: structured recaps generated the moment a call ends.
- Ask Fathom: search your whole call history conversationally to surface any moment.
- CRM sync: push notes and fields to Salesforce and HubSpot on higher tiers.
- AI Scorecards and coaching: call metrics and coaching cues for sales teams.
Pricing (billed monthly)
- Free: $0 (unlimited recording, transcription, storage, clips, and search)
- Premium: $20/month
- Team: $19/user per month (2-user minimum)
- Business: $34/user per month (CRM field sync, Deal View, coaching)
- Enterprise: Custom
Bot-free capture is available in beta; the default is a bot. Transcription covers 38 languages, and there is no dedicated mobile app.
What Fathom users love
- Top-tier transcription, even with background noise.
"The accuracy of the transcription is top-tier, even with background noise, and the AI-generated summaries are a total game-changer for my productivity." (Capterra)
- Better notes than the app they used before.
"I love the great notes it creates at the end I was using a different note taking app but Fathom is so much better." (Capterra)
What Fathom users flag
- Sharing and access can be buggy.
"There are some bugs in terms of sharing recordings and granting access." (Capterra)
- No mobile app for in-person meetings.
"There is no app version of this AI Notetaker. An app version would make it easier to record in-person meetings without a PC present" (Capterra)
3. Otter
Source: Otter
If you read your transcripts regularly then Otter is likely going to be the best choice. One of the things that makes Otter particularly well-suited for use in lectures, interviews, etc., is captions appear live during conversations. This allows users to listen to their peers while simultaneously reading a copy of their words.
For teams still comparing Otter AI alternatives and competitors, this real-time captioning is usually the deciding factor. So, if you left tl;dv in order to improve accessibility, but not for improved video, then Otter is the closest fit available, especially if real time collaboration around a live transcript matters to you.
Key Features
- Real-time transcription and captions: live transcripts across Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet.
- Speaker identification: attributes each line to the right participant automatically.
- AI Chat and summaries: structured recaps, action items, and Q&A after each call.
- Otter Assistant: joins calls automatically and records with no manual setup.
- Custom vocabulary: add names and terms, and search by keyword, speaker, or date.
Pricing (billed monthly)
- Basic: Free (300 transcription minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation, 3 lifetime imports)
- Pro: $16.99/user per month (1,200 minutes a month, 90-minute meetings)
- Business: $30/user per month (unlimited meetings, 4-hour meetings, admin analytics)
- Enterprise: Custom
Otter is bot-based (the Otter Assistant joins the call) and supports 6 languages (English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, Chinese, with German and Chinese in beta).
What Otter users love
- Summaries that let you stop taking notes.
"The summaries from meetings are thorough and help me to just focus on what's being said instead of taking notes." (Capterra)
- Set-and-forget transcription.
"I love the instant transcription feature and the fact that you can 'set and forget' Otter with your meetings." (Capterra)
What Otter users flag
- Pricey if you do not connect other apps.
"It's also pretty pricey if you're not going to link it to other apps, which I don't." (Capterra)
- Accents and background noise trip it up.
"Because of accents and background noise, the system often makes mistakes and fails to recognize speech correctly." (Capterra)
4. Fireflies
Source: Fireflies
Fireflies is a good option if you are looking for a team solution to analyze meetings versus simply remembering them. The bot named Fred records the meeting, and the results lean very heavily towards meeting intelligence and meeting insights: who spoke, how long they spoke, and how the overall feel of the conversation went. If you decided to leave tl;dv because you had outgrown the reporting it offers, then Fireflies represents a significant improvement, provided you are willing to allow a bot into your meetings, or you can look at broader Notta and Fireflies-style enterprise alternatives if you need more flexibility.
Key Features
- Transcription and recording: captures calls across platforms, dialers, and uploads.
- AskFred: an AI assistant that answers questions and summarizes across meetings.
- AI Skills: 200+ ready-made prompts like BANT and MEDDIC, billed in AI credits.
- Conversation intelligence: talk-time, sentiment, and speaker metrics for coaching.
- Wide integrations: 200+ apps including CRMs, Slack, and dialers.
Pricing (billed monthly)
- Free: $0 (20 AI credits, unlimited transcription, 400 minutes of storage)
- Pro: $18/seat per month (20 AI credits, 8,000 minutes of storage)
- Business: $29/seat per month (30 AI credits, unlimited storage, conversation intelligence)
- Enterprise: $39/seat per month, billed annually (50 AI credits, SSO, SCIM, HIPAA)
Every tier caps monthly AI credits, so heavier AI use is metered, which is why many teams explore Fireflies alternatives that avoid per-use AI credits. Fireflies is bot-based and supports 100+ languages.
What Fireflies users love
- A reliable set of summaries, transcripts, and features.
"The summaries are useful, the transcripts are generally reliable, and the platform has a strong range of features" (Capterra)
What Fireflies users flag
- Search needs precise keywords.
"The search feature requires fairly specific keywords to surface the right recording...it can take a little extra time" (Capterra)
- Accents can trip up the transcription.
"Sometimes the transcription can miss or slightly misinterpret certain words, especially when there are strong accents" (Capterra)
Not sure your meeting data is safe where it is now?
Jamie keeps all meetings within Europe, has its own ISO 27001 certification as well as DORA compliance, does not train AI models with your conversations, and deletes your audio once it is transcribed.
5. Avoma
Source: Avoma
Avoma is the heaviest AI powered meeting assistant on this list, and that is deliberate. Avoma bundles the advanced features sales and customer success teams ask for, and is intended for those teams who want everything associated with their meetings, the meeting itself, updates to CRM data, scheduling and forecasting, in one place rather than four.
If you want a deeper Avoma review of features and pricing, it’s particularly useful for evaluating those bundled capabilities against Jamie. If you were only using tl;dv to write down meeting notes, Avoma may seem overwhelming. However, if you were using tl;dv and three other tools to get through each day, Avoma could provide some much-needed relief.
Key Features
- AI Meeting Assistant: auto-records, transcribes with speaker ID, and writes notes.
- Auto CRM sync: saves notes and drafts follow-up emails into your CRM.
- Built-in scheduler: booking, round-robin, and lead routing without a separate tool.
- Conversation intelligence: call scoring, trackers, and coaching (paid add-on).
- Revenue intelligence: deal and churn-risk alerts and forecasting (paid add-on).
Pricing (billed monthly)
- Startup: $29/seat per month (up to 25 seats)
- Organization: $39/seat per month (custom AI templates, 70+ language translation, API)
- Enterprise: $39/seat per month, billed annually (10-seat minimum; SSO, HIPAA, DPAs)
- Add-ons: Conversation Intelligence and Revenue Intelligence at +$35/month each
Avoma has no permanent free recorder plan, just a 14-day free trial (free viewer seats aside). It supports both bot-based and bot-free native recording, and 70+ languages for translation.
What Avoma users love
- Automatic recording plus easy text review.
"Automatic zoom call/meeting recording and integration. Speech to text for easy review." (Capterra)
- Easy to adopt across a whole team.
"Easy to adopt, intuitive to learn, value gained across my entire organization" (Capterra)
What Avoma users flag
- The interface can take some navigating.
"User interface could be a little easier to navigate, but very minor." (Capterra)
- Transcription accuracy varies with audio quality.
"the precision of the transcription and the analysis automatic can vary depending on the quality of the audio" (Capterra)
6. Granola
Source: Granola
Granola is perhaps the most understated product on this list. Announcements are never made during your call and no bots ever join it. Granola also keeps any typed notes you took inside the final meeting documentation created after each meeting.
If you are weighing the two directly, a detailed Granola review and comparison with Jamie highlights where each tool fits best. So if privacy issues or a desktop-based workflow are what led you to leave tl;dv, Granola has a user experience that mirrors how Jamie works.
Key Features
- Bot-free capture: transcribes your computer's audio directly, no bot joins the call.
- Blended notes: merges your typed notes with the AI transcript into one clean summary.
- AI chat across meetings: ask questions within a meeting or across your whole history.
- Action items and briefings: automatic next steps, plus pre-meeting briefings from your calendar.
- Templates and integrations: custom templates, shared folders, Notion, Slack, HubSpot, and Attio (paid).
Pricing (billed monthly)
- Free: $0 (AI notes, limited history, AI chat, templates, multi-language, opt out of model training)
- Business: $14/user per month (unlimited notes and history, advanced models, integrations, MCP, API)
- Enterprise: $35/user per month (SSO, enterprise security, org-wide auto-deletion, admin controls)
Granola is bot-free, runs on Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android, and captures in-person meetings and phone calls through its mobile apps.
What Granola users love
- Summarizes your calls without you taking notes.
"I've been using Granola for a week, and it's honestly a game-changer. I love how it automatically summarizes my calls and captures the key points without me needing to take notes." (Product Hunt)
What Granola users flag
- The iPhone app does not transcribe Zoom like the Mac app.
"I do wish the IOS version would transcribe zoom meetings like the MacOS version does - hopefully soon" (Product Hunt)
- Battery drain in back-to-back meetings.
"My only concerns are around quick laptop battery drain when truly in back to back meetings." (Product Hunt)
7. Grain
Source: Grain
Grain offers a number of features that make it the most comparable to tl;dv. Grain lets you create video clips, reels and playlists that can be shared, and it includes a sales analytics layer that maps calls onto your sales process. So if video clips were the primary factor that prompted you to select tl;dv in the first place, then moving to Grain retains the most familiarity, though broader meeting note software reviews can surface lighter options if you do not need video-heavy workflows.
Key Features
- Video clips and reels: turn call moments into shareable clips, playlists, and highlights.
- Bot or bot-free capture: record with the Grain bot for video, or bot-free from your desktop.
- AI notes and recaps: summaries, next steps, and automatic meeting recaps.
- Conversation and revenue intelligence: trackers, AI coaching, and team interaction metrics.
- CRM sync and export: HubSpot and Salesforce, plus one-click export to Claude and ChatGPT.
Pricing (billed monthly)
- Free: $0 (unlimited meetings with a 45-minute cap, AI notes and action items, desktop capture, 30-day history)
- Starter: $19/seat per month (unlimited duration and history, custom AI prompts, Slack)
- Business: $39/seat per month (HubSpot, Salesforce, AI coaching, trackers, team metrics)
- Enterprise: Custom (SAML SSO, priority API support, dedicated CS manager)
Grain's site advertises 130+ languages for transcription. It offers both bot and bot-free desktop capture, with a Mac desktop app plus web, iPhone, and Android.
What Grain users love
- A clean, intuitive interface for finding and sharing moments.
"The UI is clean and intuitive, making it easy to navigate recordings, find key moments, and share clips without any learning curve." (G2)
- Organized research libraries with quick transcript access.
"I like that I can store all of our research videos into specific playlists and that I can access them with the transcriptions quickly." (G2)
What Grain users flag
- The recorder takes up space on screen.
"Like most tools when Grain is recording it takes up a space in our Google Meet which can take up the screen space for the interview at times." (G2)
- Some interface parts feel clunky.
"Certain aspects of the interface and adding highlights to stories can be clunky." (G2)
So what is the best tl;dv alternative?
The best tl;dv alternative depends on what pushed you to look at other AI meeting tools. Jamie is designed for what drove you to look in the first place: the limits on the free plan, the credit counter, the bot in your calls, and a straight answer on how securely your data is kept. Jamie allows unlimited Ask AI without charging per-use AI credits. Jamie records with no bot in any mode, in over 100 languages, online or in person. Jamie keeps your data within Europe under its own ISO 27001 certification and DORA compliance. When considering other tools in the list;
- Want the video side tl;dv is known for? Grain is the closest match.
- Chasing a generous free plan? Fathom and Jamie.
- Live in real-time captions? Otter and Jamie.
- Need sales and CRM depth? Avoma, Fireflies, and Jamie.
- Want private, bot-free desktop notes? Granola or Jamie.
Most teams switch for one specific reason, and whatever you land on, you now have the current facts to switch with confidence.
Ready to leave the credit counter and the bot behind?
Jamie gives you unlimited Ask AI with zero per-use AI credits, zero bots in a call, note-taking in over 100 languages online or in person, and all of your data stored in Europe.
FAQs on the best tl;dv alternatives
What does tl;dv stand for?
tl;dv stands for "too long; didn't view." It is a take-off of the commonly used "tl;dr", which means too long; didn't read. The purpose of tl;dv is to record your meetings and summarize them into AI meeting summaries, so you do not have to watch them back.
Is tl;dv free?
tl;dv has a free plan, but the AI is capped. It provides full AI meeting notes for your first 10 meetings. After that, only the first 10 minutes of each new meeting are summarized. These limits remain in place for the lifetime of your account rather than resetting monthly. Jamie's paid plans start at EUR 25 a month, and Jamie's free plan gives you 10 full meetings a month, up to 30 minutes each, with unlimited Ask AI and no per-use AI credits.
Is tl;dv safe?
Yes. tl;dv is a European company, all hosted within the EU, has GDPR compliance and is SOC 2 Type II certified, and states that they do not use your data to train their AI. If you need more than that, Jamie holds its own ISO 27001 certification as well as DORA compliance on top of GDPR.
Does tl;dv use a bot?
By default, yes. tl;dv sends a bot that joins your meeting as a participant. tl;dv also has a bot-free desktop app that records your computer's system audio. Jamie never uses a bot in any mode, because Jamie records from your own device.
What is the best tl;dv alternative?
Jamie is the best tl;dv alternative for most teams, because Jamie gives you private, bot-free notes with no per-use AI credits and keeps your data in Europe. If you want a direct comparison, tl;dv vs Jamie for note taking walks through the tradeoffs. If your priority is different: Grain for video clips, Fathom for a generous free plan, Otter for real-time captions, and Avoma or Fireflies for sales and CRM depth.
Related reading
- Comparing the two head to head? See tl;dv vs Jamie side by side.
- Tempted by Fathom's free plan? Read Fathom vs Jamie first.
- Weighing Otter's live captions? Compare Otter vs Jamie.
- Looking at Avoma for sales and CS? See Avoma vs Jamie.
- Torn between the two bot-free notepads? Read Jamie vs Granola.
- Want every bot-free option side by side? See Granola vs Superpowered vs Krisp vs Jamie.
Sanduni Yureka is a Growth Content Editor at Jamie, known for driving a 10x increase in website traffic for clients across Singapore, the U.S., and Germany. With an LLB Honors degree and a background in law, Sanduni transitioned from aspiring lawyer to digital marketing expert during the 2019 lockdown. She now specializes in crafting high-impact SEO strategies for AI-powered SaaS companies, particularly those using large language models (LLMs). When she’s not binge-watching true crime shows, Sanduni is obsessed with studying everything SEO.
![tl;dv vs Jamie: Which One Is Best for Note Taking? [2025]](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.meetjamie.ai%2Fapi%2Fmedia%2Ffile%2Ftldv_vs_Jamie_Which_One_Is_Best_for_Note_Taking_2025-e6lcea.png%3Fprefix%3Dpayload%262025-09-26T08%253A37%253A12.082Z&w=3840&q=75)
