Fireflies

Fireflies was co-founded by Krish Ramineni and Sam Udotong. Krish, who serves as the CEO, brought his experience as a former Product Manager at Microsoft (working on teams like Skype and Office) to solve the chronic "meeting fatigue" that plagues corporate life. Sam, the CTO, is an MIT alum with a deep background in aerospace engineering and machine learning. Together, they launched Fireflies in 2017 with a radical bet: that voice, not text, would be the next great frontier for AI data.

The company is a remote-first startup, currently employing over 100 people across 20 different countries. They are backed by major venture firms like Khosla Ventures and Canaan Partners, and as of early 2026, they have joined the "Unicorn Club" with a billion-dollar valuation. Despite their massive growth, the founders have kept the company focused on a product-led growth model, often releasing features at a breakneck pace and prioritizing a user-first philosophy that treats meeting privacy as a core engineering challenge.

Fireflies is for the Sales and Customer Success Team that lives in its CRM. Because it automatically logs every detail of a call into Salesforce or HubSpot, it saves sales reps hours of manual data entry every week. It is also a favorite for Recruiters and HR Professionals who need to record interviews and share key soundbites with hiring managers without forcing everyone to sit through a 60-minute recording.

In 2026, we see a massive uptick in Project Managers and Researchers using the tool to capture "tribal knowledge." If a developer explains a complex piece of code during a meeting, Fireflies ensures that the explanation is transcribed and searchable forever. It’s for anyone who hates the "Wait, what did we decide?" feeling after a long call. If your job involves talking to people and making decisions, Fireflies is designed to be your digital shadow.

• • Freelancers & Consultants: Who need accurate records of client requirements for billing and project scoping.
• • Executive Assistants: Who can use the auto-summaries to draft professional minutes in minutes instead of hours.
• • Academic Researchers: Who need a reliable way to transcribe focus groups and interviews with time-stamped citations.

Fireflies is a multitasking powerhouse. Its core capability is Meeting Recording and Transcription, but it goes much deeper with AI Super Summaries. These summaries break down a call into a meeting overview, detailed notes, action items, and next steps. You don't have to listen to the whole hour; you can skim the highlights in 5 minutes. Its AskFred assistant acts like a person sitting in the corner of the room, ready to answer questions about the call's content or even help brainstorm new ideas based on the transcript.

One of its most "fun" features is Soundbites. You can highlight a specific part of a transcript and turn it into a shareable audio clip. This is perfect for sharing "customer love" with the marketing team or a specific bug report with developers. In 2026, they also offer Live Assist, a real-time transcription feed that builds notes while the meeting is happening. This allows you to "Ask Fred" for context from a meeting three months ago while you're still on the current call, ensuring you never get caught off guard.

Finally, the Conversation Intelligence suite provides a 30,000-foot view of your company's communication. You can see dashboards of "Talk-Time Balance" to ensure meetings aren't dominated by a single voice, or track "Topic Trends" to see if customers are complaining more about a specific feature this month. It turns human speech into quantitative data that can be used for coaching, strategy, and performance reviews.

• • Topic Trackers: Set up alerts for specific words like "Price," "Discount," or "Cancel" to jump straight to those moments in every call.
• • Sentiment Analysis: Automatically detect the "vibe" of a meeting—was the customer happy, frustrated, or neutral?
• • Custom Vocabulary: Train the AI to recognize your specific industry jargon, product names, and teammate names for 95%+ accuracy.

Fireflies uses a tiered pricing model that ranges from "Free" to "Enterprise." The Free Plan is a great way to dip your toes in, offering unlimited transcription but with a catch: you only get 800 minutes of total storage and limited AI summaries. This usually fills up in about 6 weeks for a regular user. The Pro Plan costs $18/mo (or $10/mo billed annually). This is the "sweet spot" for individuals, unlocking 8,000 minutes of storage and full access to AI-generated notes.

For teams, the Business Plan is the standard, costing $29/mo (or $19/mo annually). This is where you unlock Video Recording and Unlimited Storage. If you conduct more than 30 meetings a month, you really need to be on this tier. It also unlocks the premium CRM integrations (Salesforce/HubSpot), which are non-negotiable for most modern sales teams.

For large organizations, the Enterprise Plan starts at roughly **$39/mo** and includes "must-have" security features like HIPAA compliance, Single Sign-On (SSO), and dedicated account management. One thing to watch for in 2026 is the AI Credit system. While summaries are included, advanced tasks for "AskFred" consume credits. You get a set amount each month based on your plan, but heavy users may need to buy "Credit Packs" to keep the AI active at all times.

• • Free ($0): 800 min storage, basic search, limited AI credits.
• • Pro ($10/mo): 8,000 min storage, full AI summaries, talk-time analytics.
• • Business ($19/mo): Unlimited storage, Video recording, CRM automation, admin controls.

The primary thing to watch out for is the Meeting Bot Etiquette. Fireflies sends a "Notetaker" bot into your meetings. While you can rename the bot, it is still a visible participant. Some users (and their clients) find this intrusive or distracting. If you have high-stakes relationship-building calls, you might want to warn your guests beforehand or use the "Silent Tab Recorder" feature in the Chrome extension which records without a visible bot.

You should also pay attention to the Storage Limits on Pro. While 8,000 minutes sounds like a lot, a busy professional can hit that limit in less than 6 months. Once you hit the cap, you either have to delete old recordings (and lose your history) or upgrade to Business. Lastly, be aware of the Transcription Accuracy. While it claims 95%, it can still struggle with heavy accents, background noise, or people talking over each other. It is always a good idea to quickly review and edit the action items before sending them to a client.

In 2026, the AI notetaker market is crowded. Otter.ai is the most direct rival; it is excellent for real-time collaboration and has a better "live" feel, but it lacks the deep CRM integrations that make Fireflies a powerhouse for sales teams. If you want something 100% free and simpler, Fathom is a fantastic choice—it offers unlimited video recording and transcription for individuals for free, though it's missing the high-end analytics found in Fireflies.

For those who need a more "invisible" experience, tl;dv is a strong alternative. It allows you to record meetings without a bot joining in some cases and has a more modern, streamlined user interface. If you are a sales leader who needs deep "Sales Coaching" (e.g., detecting if a rep mentioned a specific discount or objection), Gong or MeetGeek provide much more advanced conversation intelligence, though at a significantly higher price point.

• • Otter.ai: Better for students and journalists who need real-time, shared notes.
• • Fathom: The king of free video transcription for individual users.
• • MeetGeek: Best for teams who want highly structured AI summaries and deep "Talk-Time" dashboards.

• Is Fireflies GDPR and HIPAA compliant? Yes. In 2026, Fireflies follows SOC 2 Type II standards and is fully GDPR compliant. HIPAA compliance (including a BAA) is available, but you must be on the Enterprise tier to unlock it.

• Can I stop the bot from joining specific meetings? Absolutely. You can set up "Autojoin" rules to only join meetings you've organized, or you can manually invite the bot to specific calls. You can also kick the bot out of a live call at any time with a single click.

• Does it support languages other than English? Yes, Fireflies supports transcription in over 30 languages, including Spanish, French, German, Chinese, and Hindi. However, the interface itself is primarily in English.

• Can I download my transcripts? Yes, on paid plans, you can download transcripts in various formats including PDF, DOCX, SRT (for subtitles), and even JSON for developers.

• Does Fireflies use my data to train its models? Fireflies has a very strict privacy policy stating that they do NOT use customer meeting data to train their proprietary AI models, ensuring your business secrets stay private.