Comparison
Published
The best local meeting transcription apps for Mac and Windows in 2026
Seven tools that record meetings without a bot, compared on what people actually ask: Russian, speaker separation, local summaries, MCP for AI assistants and price. Every cell checked against the vendor's own pages on October 31, 2026.
If you want meeting transcripts without sending your audio to someone else's server, the choice in 2026 comes down to a handful of apps. We make one of them — Daisy — so read this with that in mind. To keep it fair, every fact below comes from each vendor's own site, docs or release notes, checked on October 31, 2026, and we say plainly where others are ahead.
- Checked
- October 31, 2026, against vendor sites, docs, pricing pages and changelogs
- Included
- Apps that record meetings from your computer without a bot and can transcribe on the device
- Granola
- Included for contrast: bot-free, but cloud transcription
- Not covered
- Accuracy. We only publish that with raw output on the same audio
The comparison
| App | Meetings without a bot | Russian | Speakers | Local summaries | MCP | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daisy | Yes, Mac | Yes, on-device | Yes, on-device | Yes — Ollama, LM Studio, Apple Intelligence | Local, included | Local core free; optional cloud AI planned |
| MacWhisper | Yes, Mac; detects meeting apps | Yes | Yes — on-device or cloud | Yes — Ollama, LM Studio, Apple | None found; CLI tool | Free tier; Pro €64 one-time |
| OpenWhispr | Yes, Mac and Windows | Through Whisper and Parakeet models | Yes, on-device (not Intel Macs) | Yes — local model | Hosted, Pro plan | Free; Pro $8/mo or $80/yr |
| Meetily | Yes, Mac and Windows | Through Whisper and Parakeet models | Pro only, on-device | Yes — Ollama | Local, Pro only | Community free (MIT); Pro $10/mo billed yearly |
| Anarlog | Yes, Mac; Windows and Linux in beta | Yes | On-device | Yes — Ollama, LM Studio, Apple (experimental) | Local, free; optional hosted | Free; Pro $14/mo or $140/yr |
| Superwhisper | Yes, Mac (since October 2026) | Whisper models yes; the recommended offline meeting model no | Yes, on-device | Yes — small local models | Local, via CLI | Free tier; Pro $8.49/mo, $84.99/yr or $249.99 lifetime |
| Granola | Yes, Mac and Windows | Yes, in the cloud | Me / Them; names for Zoom, Meet, Teams | No — cloud only | Hosted | Free (30-day history); Business $14/user-mo |
Who each one is for
Daisy — Mac users who want meetings as plain Markdown files in their own folder, Russian as a first-class language, and an MCP server on their own machine so Claude, Cursor or Codex can work with the archive. Open source under Apache 2.0, no account. Mac only for now; iPhone and Windows are in development.
MacWhisper — the most mature local transcription app on the Mac, strongest on files: batch transcription, subtitles, many models and export formats, plus meeting recording and dictation. Closed source, one-time Pro licence. macwhisper.com.
OpenWhispr — open source (MIT), runs on Mac, Windows, Linux and iPhone, with dictation, meetings and on-device speakers. Its MCP server is hosted and needs Pro. docs.openwhispr.com.
Meetily — open-source community edition for Mac and Windows with local Whisper or Parakeet and Ollama summaries; speakers and a local MCP server are in the paid Pro edition. Meetily on GitHub.
Anarlog (formerly Hyprnote, then Char) — open source (MIT), local transcription and summaries on Apple Silicon, a free local MCP server, optional sync and cloud features in Pro. anarlog.so.
Superwhisper — a popular dictation app that added Meetings in October 2026, with offline transcription and summaries on the Mac. Check the model if you need Russian. superwhisper.com.
Granola — the polished bot-free note-taker, but transcription and summaries run in the cloud and an account is required. Included so the difference between “bot-free” and “local” is visible. granola.ai.
How to choose
- Mostly files, podcasts or subtitles: MacWhisper.
- Windows or Linux today: OpenWhispr, Meetily or Anarlog's beta.
- Meetings as plain files plus a local MCP server, with no account: Daisy.
- Polish and team features matter more than where audio is processed: Granola.