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Fireflies.ai vs Recal

Two fact sheets from our own research, side by side — pricing, platforms, API access and status re-checked by us rather than quoted from the vendors. Fireflies.ai starts at $10, Recal at $14. Both have a free tier. Only Fireflies.ai ships a public API.

Fireflies.aiMeeting recorder that files notes into your CRMRecalTurns Slack threads, meetings, and calls into recap summaries, decisions, and tasks.

Side by side

FactFireflies.aiRecal
CategoryMeeting AssistantsMeeting Assistants
Pricing modelFreemiumFreemium
Starts at$10 month$14 month
Public APIYesNo
PlatformsWeb, iOS, Android, Chrome Ext, API, Slack AppWeb, Chrome Ext
CompanyFireflies.ai Corp.Recal
Launched2016—
Last verifiedSep 6, 2026Sep 1, 2026

What our research says

Fireflies.ai

Unlimited transcription on the free tier is the hook and it is genuinely unlimited — the meter sits on storage and AI credits, which is where any team of real size ends up on a paid seat.

Pros

  • Transcription minutes are unlimited on every tier, including Free
  • API access is not paywalled — it starts on the free plan
  • Pro at $10/seat undercuts most rival meeting assistants
  • Storage becomes unlimited from the $19 Business tier

Cons

  • Monthly billing is about 1.8x the annual rate on Pro and 1.5x on Business
  • AI credits, not transcription, are the real ration — 20 a month on both Free and Pro
  • Free storage is 400 minutes for the entire team, not per person
  • Enterprise is annual-only at $39/seat

Recal

Ingests Slack threads, meetings, calls, and shared docs, then produces recap summaries, decisions, and task lists that sync into Linear, Notion, Jira, and GitHub. The free plan covers only 30 minutes of async recaps a month, so any real team use lands on a paid tier quickly.

Pros

  • Covers both meetings and async Slack threads, not just calls
  • Pushes extracted tasks directly into Linear, Notion, Jira, and GitHub
  • Free Starter tier exists to test before paying

Cons

  • Free tier capped at just 30 minutes of async recaps per month
  • Meeting-recap and async-recap minutes are tracked and billed separately, complicating usage estimates
  • No native desktop app; relies on browser extension and integrations

Which one fits

Choose Fireflies.ai if you need

  • Sales and success teams who want call notes landing in the CRM by themselves
  • Distributed teams searching across months of past meetings
  • Developers pulling meeting data out through an API on any plan

Choose Recal if you need

  • Teams wanting meeting and Slack recaps pushed into existing task tools
  • Async-first teams summarizing long Slack threads into decisions
  • Managers wanting a searchable record of what was decided and by whom

More comparisons

All Fireflies.ai alternatives →All Recal alternatives →Browse all Meeting Assistants →