Three differences: privacy, privacy and privacy.

Otter.ai, Fireflies.ai and Plaud are capable note-takers. They process your meetings in the cloud. Vault Notes does everything on your phone. Below is how that plays out, point by point, with a source for every claim about the others.

  • Your audio stays on your phone

    Transcription, speakers and the summary run on the device. The others send the audio to their cloud for processing.

  • Nobody trains on your meetings

    There is nothing to train on: no copy ever reaches us or an AI provider. With cloud services that depends on their policy and your settings.

  • No account, no bot

    Install and record. No sign-up, no recorder bound to an account, no bot joining your video call.

Point by point

Rows marked with a teal square are about privacy. "Unknown" means the vendor's public pages do not say.

Vault Notes compared with Otter.ai, Fireflies.ai and Plaud
Vault NotesOtter.aiFireflies.aiPlaud
Where your audio is processedOn your phoneIn the cloud (Amazon Web Services)2In the cloud4In the cloud, with GPT, Claude and Gemini6,7
Where your notes are keptEncrypted, on your phoneIn Otter's cloud2In Fireflies' cloud4On your phone; in Plaud's cloud if you turn on Cloud Sync6
Your meetings used to train AINot possible: nothing leaves your phoneYes: de-identified recordings and transcripts, per the privacy policy2Not by default4Not by default; only if you switch it on6
Account neededNoYes2Yes3Yes, the recorder is bound to your account6
Transcribe and summarise without internetYes, after the one-time model downloadNo, processing happens in the cloud2No, processing happens in the cloud4Records offline on the device; processing happens in the cloud6
Bot joins your online meetingNo, it listens through your phoneYes, joins Zoom, Teams and Google Meet1Yes, Fred joins or is invited5Unknown
Speaker identificationYes, on the phone, with names and coloursYes1Yes, with talk time per speaker3Yes7
AI summaryYes, on the phone: decisions, action items, open questionsYes1Yes3Yes7
Chat about a meetingcoming soonon the phoneYes, AI Chat1Yes, AskFred3Yes, Ask Plaud7
Mind mapcoming soonUnknownUnknownYes7
Share notescoming soonthrough your phone's share sheetYes, private channels and public links1Yes, recap links3Yes, export7
Extra device neededNo, your own Android phoneNo, apps for iOS and Android1No, mobile app for in-person meetings5Yes, a Plaud recorder (Note Pro €189 in the EU store)8
Price modelFree: 5 meetings a month. Pro €9.99 a month, €69.99 a year or €149.99 onceFree plan, paid plans per user1Free plan, paid plans per user3Device, plus a free plan (300 min a month) or a subscription7

Where the others are ahead

  • Chat about a meeting (all three) and mind maps (Plaud): available today; at Vault Notes coming soon, on the phone.
  • Sharing and team workspaces: the others share links and channels in their cloud. Vault Notes sharing via your phone's share sheet is coming soon.
  • iPhone: Vault Notes starts on Android. Otter.ai and Fireflies.ai have iOS apps.
  • Calendar and video-call integrations: the cloud services join your online meetings. Vault Notes listens through the phone in the room or next to your laptop speaker.

Sources

Checked October 2026 on the vendors' own public pages. Products change; if something here is out of date, tell us at support and we correct it. Otter.ai, Fireflies.ai and Plaud are trademarks of their owners; Vault Notes is not affiliated with them.

  1. Otter.ai, pricing and plan features: https://otter.ai/pricing
  2. Otter.ai, privacy policy: https://otter.ai/privacy-policy
  3. Fireflies.ai, pricing and plan features: https://fireflies.ai/pricing
  4. Fireflies.ai, security: https://fireflies.ai/security
  5. Fireflies.ai, home page: https://fireflies.ai/
  6. Plaud, Trust Center: https://www.plaud.ai/pages/trust-center
  7. Plaud, Plaud Intelligence: https://www.plaud.ai/pages/plaud-intelligence
  8. Plaud EU store, Plaud Note Pro: https://eu.plaud.ai/collections/plaud-note-pro-series

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