Granola vs Spellar AI (2026)

Granola

by Granola, Inc.

Spellar AI

by Spellar LTD

Pros

• ✓Captures audio from the device instead of sending a bot into the call, so it works with any meeting app, with apps for Mac, Windows, iPhone, Android and Apple Watch.
• ✓The free Basic plan includes unlimited AI meeting notes, AI chat, Recipes, templates, shared folders and the Slack integration, and its MCP server reaches Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor and other AI tools on every plan.
• ✓Enterprise adds HIPAA-compliant workspaces with a Business Associate Agreement, SCIM and an audit API at a published $35 per user per month, bought in the app.

Limitations

• –Recording must be started manually for each meeting because Granola does not auto-join or auto-record calls, so a meeting nobody starts is not captured.
• –Audio is deleted after transcription, so there is no recording to play back, and the free Basic plan shows only the last 30 days of notes in the app.
• –HIPAA coverage, SSO, SCIM and a workspace-wide training opt-out require Enterprise, SSO is offered to teams of 50 or more users, and Business allows only a per-user opt-out.

Pros

• ✓No bot joins calls: Spellar records natively on Mac, iPhone, and iPad audio without sending a participant into the meeting, eliminating the privacy concern and awkward presence that bot-based tools like Fireflies.ai, tl;dv, and Fathom introduce
• ✓Cross-meeting memory lets users query what was said across all past recordings with cited, sourced answers linked to the exact moment in the original transcript, rather than searching through individual session notes manually
• ✓Every premium AI model is included in the base subscription: GPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity are all available without additional cost and are switchable per meeting, per template, or per individual question

Limitations

• –No free tier: Spellar Pro starts at $18.99 per month (or $11.99 per month annual) with no permanent free plan, unlike Fathom and Fireflies.ai which both offer free tiers with meaningful usage limits
• –No SOC 2 Type II or ISO 27001 certification: Spellar covers UK GDPR and CCPA compliance but has not completed third-party security audits, which limits enterprise procurement in regulated industries where Fathom and Fireflies.ai have confirmed certifications
• –Mac, iPhone, iPad, and web only: no Windows client means organizations on Windows-first environments cannot standardize on Spellar, and Windows users in mixed-device teams must use the web app which lacks native OS-level audio capture