Granola alternatives

What Granola is and who it is for

Granola is aimed at people who go from meeting to meeting and want notes with no bot joining. It records from the device on every plan, so skipping the bot does not set us apart from Granola.

It has a free plan with 30 days of history, plus Business and Enterprise. Its MCP works with Claude, ChatGPT and Claude Code.

Granola and PolarParrot side by side

When Granola is the better choice

• You use Windows, iPhone, Android or Apple Watch. PolarParrot only runs on a Mac. If you take your phone to an in-person meeting, there is no option here.
• You want to stay free. Granola has an ongoing free plan with 30 days of history. PolarParrot's free part is a few meetings.
• You have a lot of meeting hours. PolarParrot Pro has a monthly hour cap.
• You are a team. Granola sells Business and Enterprise, with an API. PolarParrot has no team plan.

When PolarParrot fits

• You want the app in Spanish. Granola's interface is English only.
• You want your AI to read and nothing else. Granola's MCP can add or remove notes from folders unless an Enterprise admin turns that off. PolarParrot's only reads, always.
• You want to read transcripts over MCP without paying. Granola's free plan has no transcripts over MCP. PolarParrot's connector is on every plan.

Is there a cheaper alternative to Granola?

Granola Business costs $14 per user a month. It depends on what you need:

• PolarParrot Pro costs €15 a month with VAT included and comes with 20 hours. Similar, not cheaper.
• Tactiq: Free with 10 transcripts a month. Pro: €6.67 paid yearly. Fellow: 5 free notes for life. Team: $11 a month, or $7 paid yearly. Paid yearly they are cheaper, and they work differently.
• Fathom and Circleback have free plans with unlimited meetings.

Other Granola alternatives

Prices as they appeared on each website on 2 November 2026. Some websites change the currency by country. Only PolarParrot says here whether tax is included.

Other Granola alternatives, according to each website as of 2 November 2026

Tool	Who it is for	Published price	What it does
PolarParrotpricing	Anyone who has video meetings on a Mac and wants the notes done without taking any. Mac only.	Free for 3 meetings per Mac, up to 1 hour each, no card. Pro: €15 a month or €150 a year, with 20 hours of meetings a month, VAT included and no minimum term.	Records your Mac's audio and your microphone, with no bot on the call and with the macOS permissions. Keeps your voice apart from everyone else's and leaves notes with a summary, decisions, actions and questions. Your AI reads them over MCP on every plan, read-only.
Jamiesource, 2 November 2026	Venture capital, banking, M&A, law and consulting firms with sensitive conversations.	Free: 10 AI notes a month, 30 minutes per meeting. Plus: €21, with 20 notes a month and 2 hours per meeting. Pro: €39 a month paid yearly, with unlimited notes and 5 hours per meeting. Team: €33 per seat a month paid yearly. Enterprise is custom.	From the device, with no bot. Mac, Windows, web and iOS.
MacWhispersource, 2 November 2026	People who want to transcribe audio, video and meetings locally on their Mac.	Free version with no time limit. Pro: €64, a one-off payment per licence with lifetime updates.	From the Mac, with no bot and automatic meeting detection. It transcribes locally. Mac. There is no Windows version.
Fathomsource, 2 November 2026	People who want free notes from Zoom, Meet and Teams, and teams that want the CRM kept up to date.	Free forever, with unlimited recordings and transcripts. Premium: $20 per user a month, or $16 paid yearly. Team: $19, or $15 paid yearly, 2 users minimum. Business: $34, or $25 paid yearly, 2 users minimum.	Both: a bot by default, and bot-free device recording, in beta and only on Mac. Mac and Windows. Without the bot, Mac only.

What PolarParrot does not do

• It only runs on a Mac. There is no version for Windows, iPhone or Android.
• It needs two macOS permissions: the microphone and system audio recording. Without them it cannot record.
• FaceTime. PolarParrot cannot record the other people on FaceTime: macOS only lets it record your voice.
• Download. The App Store version is not available yet. You download PolarParrot from this website.
• The audio leaves your Mac. It is uploaded to our server to write the notes and deleted when they are done. You can change that in Settings. Transcription does not run on your Mac.
• The free part is short: 3 meetings per Mac. Pro includes 20 hours a month, and extra hours are sold separately.
• The price is per person. There is no team plan.

What we could not check

Some details about Granola we could not settle:

• Its pricing page does not say whether $14 and $35 are monthly or yearly billing.
• Languages come from the search snippet, not from opening the page.