Fireflies vs Fathom: they cap opposite things.
Fathom gives you unlimited free recording and storage, then caps advanced AI output. Fireflies gives you unlimited AI notes, then caps storage at 400 minutes. Which trade suits you depends entirely on how you work. Here is the honest head-to-head, from a company that sells a third thing.
Pricing verified Aug 18, 2026 · fathom.ai and fireflies.ai
Who should pick what.
- →You want the cleanest UX in the category and summaries that land seconds after the call ends.
- →Your meetings live on Zoom, Meet and Teams, mostly in English (about 38 languages supported).
- →You want a genuinely free unlimited recorder: unlimited recording, transcription and storage at $0.
- →You value review sentiment: Fathom sits around 5.0 on G2 across thousands of reviews, the strongest in the category.
- →You need phone and dialer capture: Aircall, RingCentral, Zoom Phone and OpenPhone, not just meeting bots.
- →Your team works in many languages: 100+ with auto-detection, against Fathom's roughly 38.
- →Integration breadth matters: 100+ native apps, an API, and niche CRMs like Wealthbox, Redtail and Affinity.
- →You want conversation-intelligence features cheaply: talk time, sentiment and team analytics at $19/user on annual billing.
Bottom line: Both are excellent standalone notetakers, and for pure notetaking either will serve you well. The sharper question, which neither pricing page asks, is whether your meeting notes should live in a separate tool at all, or next to the deals they belong to.
The two free tiers are mirror images.
Fathom Free: unlimited capture, capped intelligence
Fathom's free plan records, transcribes and stores unlimited calls forever, which no competitor matches. The catch is on the AI side: advanced summaries, action items and Ask Fathom are limited to about 5 calls a month, after which you get a basic summary template. If you record twenty calls a month, free Fathom is really a recorder with an AI trial attached.
Fireflies Free: unlimited intelligence, capped memory
Fireflies flips it: unlimited transcription and AI summaries on every call, but only 400 minutes of storage for your whole team and no video recording. Old calls age out. If you need AI notes on everything and rarely revisit recordings, free Fireflies goes further; if your call library is an asset, it does not.
Neither cap is hidden, but both are underexplained
These two limits are the most misstated facts in every comparison article we checked. Both companies disclose them, in help-center fine print. Price the paid tier you will actually need, not the free tier you will outgrow in a month.
The head-to-head, plus where we sit.
We put Vesso in the third column because you are on our site and hiding it would be silly. Where the standalone tools win, the check is theirs.
Swipe the table to compare both products.
| Feature | Fathom | Fireflies | Vesso |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free tier | |||
| Free recording & storage | Unlimited | 400 min · no video | 7-day trial |
| Free AI summaries | ~5 advanced calls/mo | Unlimited | Trial only |
| Paid pricing (annual) | |||
| Entry paid tier | $16/user · Premium | $10/user · Pro | $49 · Solo, full platform |
| Team tier with CI features | $25/user · Business | $19/user · Business | Included every plan |
| Recording limits on paid | Unlimited | Storage by tier | Unlimited every plan |
| Capture & languages | |||
| Zoom, Meet, Teams | Included | Included | Included |
| Phone & dialer capture | Not included | Aircall, RingCentral, more | Not included |
| Bot-free recording | Beta | Not included | Not included |
| Languages | ~38 | 100+ | English-first |
| Intelligence | |||
| Coaching scorecards | Business tier | Business tier | Every plan · 13 meeting types |
| Talk time & sentiment | Business tier | Business tier | Every plan |
| AI prep briefs before calls | Not included | Not included | Every plan · never metered |
| Live in-call assist | Not included | Not included | Included |
| Where notes live | |||
| CRM | Syncs to yours | Syncs to yours | Is the CRM |
| Follow-up | Summary email | Summary + tasks | Drafted into cadences |
| Integrations & API | Core set | 100+ apps · API | Public API + imports |
Fathom: Premium $16, Team $15, Business $25 per user on annual billing ($20/$19/$34 monthly), verified Aug 18, 2026. Fireflies: Pro $10, Business $19, Enterprise $39 annual ($18/$29 monthly), verified same day. Both change prices often; check before you buy.
A 10-person sales team, priced honestly.
If all you need is a notetaker, both incumbents are cheaper than us and you should buy one of them. The math changes when you are also paying for a CRM and outreach tools.
10 users, annual billing, notetaker only
Scorecards, CRM sync and Deal View live on this tier.
10 users, annual billing, notetaker only
Cheapest conversation-intelligence features in the category.
10 active users, annual billing, whole stack
Effective $324/mo with 2 months free. Compare against notetaker plus CRM, not notetaker alone.
The honest comparison: Vesso costs more than either notetaker alone and less than a notetaker plus almost any CRM. A typical 10-person stack of CRM, outreach data and recording runs $1,500+/mo.
Where the standalone tools beat us.
We compete with both of these products, so hold this section to a higher standard. These are real advantages.
Fireflies vs Fathom, answered.
Is Fathom really free?
Recording, transcription and storage are genuinely unlimited and free. Advanced AI output is not: after roughly 5 calls a month you get a basic summary instead of advanced summaries, action items and Ask Fathom. Unlimited AI starts at $16/user/mo on annual billing.
What are the limits of the Fireflies free plan?
Unlimited transcription and AI summaries, but 400 minutes of storage for the whole team and no video recording. Older calls effectively age out. Paid tiers raise storage to 8,000 minutes per seat (Pro, $10/user annual) or unlimited (Business, $19/user annual).
Which is more accurate, Fireflies or Fathom?
Honestly, neither has a decisive public edge. Both degrade with crosstalk, noise and heavy accents; Fireflies handles far more languages, and complaints about accuracy appear in both products' reviews. If accuracy is critical, trial both on your real calls.
Which is better for a sales team?
Between the two: Fireflies gives you conversation-intelligence features cheaper ($19 vs $25 per user annual), while Fathom's Business tier adds scorecards, CRM field sync and Deal View with a cleaner UX. Both stop at syncing notes into a CRM you pay for separately. If you want prep briefs, live assist and notes that live inside the CRM itself, that is the category Vesso is in.
How is Vesso different from both?
Vesso is not a standalone notetaker: it is a GTM workspace where unlimited recording, AI notes and prep briefs are included on every plan, never metered, and the notes attach to the accounts and deals they came from. It costs more than either tool alone ($49 to $389+/mo depending on team size) and replaces the CRM and outreach stack around them.
Fathom and Fireflies prices and tier contents were pulled from their public pricing pages on Aug 18, 2026 (fathom.video now redirects to fathom.ai). The Fathom free-tier AI cap comes from their help center; the Fireflies storage cap from their pricing page. Sentiment reflects public G2, Trustpilot and Reddit threads.
- →fathom.ai/pricing · plans and free-tier terms
- →fireflies.ai/pricing · plans and storage limits
- →fireflies.ai/integrations · dialers and app catalog
- →vesso.ai/pricing · every Vesso number on this page
Spotted something out of date? Email hello@vesso.ai so we can review it.
Notes that live next to the deal.
Unlimited recording, AI notes and prep briefs on every plan, inside the CRM.
Free for 7 days · No credit card required
Free migration support on every plan · we map your data with you before you commit