Fireflies vs Granola: bot notetaker or no bot
Choose Granola if you sit in back-to-back calls and want notes without a bot announcing itself to your client. Choose Fireflies if a sales or support team needs every call recorded, searchable and pushed into the CRM. Granola runs on your Mac, Windows PC or iPhone, captures the device audio and turns your rough jottings into a clean write-up. Fireflies joins Zoom, Google Meet and Teams as a participant, which gives you full recordings and a shared archive you can question later.
Which one to pick
Your team needs a searchable record of every client call, with summaries sent to the CRM, so anyone can check what a customer said weeks ago.
You are a founder or consultant moving between calls all day, prefer that no recorder visibly joins, and like to type a few notes yourself that the AI then expands.
Side by side
Questions
Do Fireflies and Granola both have free plans?
Yes, both list a free plan, and paid tiers are billed in US dollars. Free tiers limit how many meetings or how much history you keep. Test each on a week of your real calls before upgrading.
Will the other people on the call know I am taking notes?
With Fireflies, a bot joins the meeting as a participant, so everyone sees it. Granola records from your own device, and the other side sees nothing unusual. Either way, tell people you are transcribing: in Europe consent rules apply, and it is basic courtesy.
Which works for in-person meetings?
Granola listens through your device's microphone, so it works in a room as well as on a call, including from the iPhone app. Fireflies is designed around video platforms where its bot can join. For coffee meetings or workshops, Granola is the easier fit.
Is Granola enough for a whole sales team?
Granola suits individuals and small teams who want their own notes. A sales team that reviews calls together, coaches reps and logs everything to the CRM gets more from Fireflies' shared, searchable archive. Many founders start on Granola and add Fireflies once they hire.
Can they transcribe meetings in Spanish, German, French or Italian?
Both transcribe several languages and work for European teams. Accuracy drops with heavy accents, cross-talk and mixed-language calls, so test with your usual meetings. If your company has a works council or strict GDPR policy, check where recordings are stored before rolling either tool out.