Aside vs Otter.
Otter counts your transcription minutes, caps every single meeting, and keeps the result in a cloud where it trains its own AI.
- Otter300 mina month on Otter free, about five hour-long meetings
- Otter90 minis as long as one meeting may run on Otter pro
- Otter$16.99/mofor Otter pro billed monthly, $8.33 billed annually
- Aside$79 onceand nothing on your own Mac is metered at all
| What is being compared |  Aside |
Otter |
|---|---|---|
| Where transcripts live | Plus. Markdown in a folder you pick | Limit. Otter’s cloud |
| Trains AI on your meetings | Plus. No, and Anthropic may not train on what the note layer sends | Limit. Yes, on de-identified recordings and on transcriptions |
| Transcription | Plus. On your Mac, ~99 languages, works offline | Limit. On their servers, no offline mode |
| Metered | Plus. No, transcription is local and costs nothing per minute | Limit. Yes, by transcription minutes on every plan below business |
| Longest single meeting | Plus. No cap, on any plan | Limit. 30 min free, 90 min pro, 4 hours business |
| Price | Plus. $8/mo all-in, or $79 once (cloud optional) | Limit. $16.99/mo pro billed monthly, $8.33 billed annually, $30/user business |
| Own model or API key | Plus. Yes. Free from us, your provider bills you, or Ollama for free | Limit. Nothing on otter.ai offers one |
| MCP for agents | Plus. Included | Limit. No, API access at enterprise |
| Joins the call | Plus. Never, nothing in the attendee list | Neither. A bot by default, or bot-free from the desktop app |
| In-person conversations | Plus. Same as a call, mic plus system audio | Neither. Mobile or desktop app, mic only |
| Free | Limit. 10 meeting trial | Plus. 300 min/month, 30 min per conversation |
| Platform | Limit. macOS only | Plus. Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Chrome extension |
Otter keeps the notes, trains on them, and counts your minutes.
1. Your meetings are their training data
Otter’s privacy policy reserves the right to improve the service by “training our proprietary AI technology on de-identified audio recordings and on transcriptions (which may contain Personal Information)”, and its terms add that nothing in them stops Otter using machine learning to tune the models behind the service. Aside writes Markdown into a folder you picked. Where the note layer does send a transcript to Anthropic, Anthropic’s commercial terms state that they may not train models on it.
2. Minutes are a strange thing to buy
Otter free gives 300 minutes a month, which is about five hour-long meetings, and caps each conversation at thirty minutes. Pro raises the pool to 1,200 minutes but still stops a single meeting at ninety, and business stops one at four hours. Aside doesn’t meter anything and caps nothing, because the speech model is running on your own machine and that costs nothing per minute.
3. Otter can record without a bot now
It used to be true that Otter always turned up in the participant list, and this page used to say so. Its desktop app records the machine directly, “with your headphones on and no bot in the meeting”. The default calendar flow still sends a notetaker, and the audio still goes up to Otter to be transcribed, but the bot is no longer the difference between these two products. The meter, the cloud and the training are.
Otter’s minutes buy cloud transcription. What the local model does with the same audio is on the benchmark page.
The whole interface is a pill in the notch.
It starts when you tell it to and stops when you hang up, and on a Mac with no notch it floats at the top of the screen instead. Under the pill sit the live transcript, your own notes and a chat about the call.
Aside
Who is finishing the pricing page?
Thursday morning, once the copy lands.
Anything blocking us?
Nothing was named as a blocker. Two bugs are open in the export path and both were called out as not blocking anybody.
What launch date did we land on?
The fourteenth, and this time it was pinned rather than moved. The one thing that has to land before it is the pricing page, live before Friday.
Try the tabs. This one is live.
Nobody else in the call sees any of this. There is no link to paste, nothing to admit into the meeting, and nothing in the participant list.
Where Otter is the better answer.
- You’re not on a Mac, or you’re often not at your Mac. Otter runs in a browser, on Windows, on a phone and as a Chrome extension. Aside is a macOS app and nothing else.
- You need the bot to attend without you. Otter can sit in a call you skipped. Aside records what your machine hears, so if you’re not there, nothing is.
- You need compliance paperwork. SSO, SCIM, a HIPAA add-on and an API all exist at Otter’s enterprise tier.
- You want speaker labels while the call is still running. Aside does label speakers, on your Mac, after the recording stops, and it takes their names from the calendar invite where it can tell who is who. Otter labels them live and has had years of work on audio with many voices in it.
Asked before switching.
Can I record a call without anything joining it?
Yes. Aside records your Mac’s system audio and microphone directly, so nothing appears in the participant list and there is no link to paste. It also means a conversation at a table works exactly like a video call. Otter can record bot-free too, from its desktop app, though its calendar flow still sends a notetaker and the audio still goes to Otter’s servers either way.
Does Otter train its AI on my meetings?
Its privacy policy says it improves and monitors the service by “training our proprietary AI technology on de-identified audio recordings and on transcriptions (which may contain Personal Information)”, and its terms of service state that nothing in them stops Otter using machine learning to tune the models behind the service. Aside keeps your transcripts as files on your Mac. When the note layer sends one to Anthropic, Anthropic’s commercial terms state that they may not train models on it.
How much is Otter in 2026?
Checked 5 August 2026: basic is free with 300 minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation and 3 lifetime file imports. Pro is $16.99 a month billed monthly, or $8.33 a month billed annually, with 1,200 minutes and a 90 minute cap on any one meeting. Business is $30 per user a month, $19.99 annually, unlimited minutes and four hours per meeting. Enterprise is custom.
Does Aside have a minute limit?
No, and no per-meeting cap either, which every Otter plan has. Transcription runs locally with an open speech model, so a four hour meeting costs nothing per minute and gets metered at nothing. The only thing with usage behind it is the cloud note layer, and you can replace that with your own API key. We charge nothing for the key, and your provider bills you for what you use.
Can I keep using Otter for calls I don’t attend?
Yes, and that’s a genuine reason to. Aside only hears what your Mac hears, so a call you skipped produces nothing. If sending a stand-in to meetings is a real part of your week, Otter does something Aside structurally can’t.
Where do Aside’s transcripts end up?
As Markdown files in a folder you choose, with timestamps, alongside the summary and your own notes. Nothing expires and there’s no export step.
Can it transcribe an in-person conversation?
Yes. Aside captures the Mac microphone and system audio together, so a conversation at a table and a video call are the same thing to it. Otter records in person from its mobile or desktop app, using the device microphone.