Fireflies.ai Review: Is It the Right AI Note Taker for You in 2026?
Fireflies is a capable, team-oriented meeting assistant with some of the deepest CRM integrations in the category. But its free plan has a small storage cap and a one-time pool of AI credits, it can't record a phone call, and its per-seat pricing is built for teams more than individuals. Here's a fair look at what it does well and where it struggles.
Windows
ChromeFireflies.ai is a strong AI note taker for sales and operations teams that want every meeting pushed into a CRM and searchable across the company. It is a weaker fit for individuals: the free plan stores 400 min per team with 20 one-time AI credits, paid plans are per seat, and it cannot record a regular phone call. Wave AI is the simpler individual alternative, with phone-call recording and watch apps.
Fireflies.ai is the note taker of choice for a lot of sales and operations teams. Its note taker joins Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Webex calls, its desktop app and Chrome extension can capture meetings without a bot, and the platform layers analytics and integrations on top. This review looks at what Fireflies genuinely does well, the catches in its pricing, and how it compares to a simpler, mobile-first tool like Wave.
What Fireflies.ai does well
- Deep CRM and app integrations. Fireflies connects to Salesforce, HubSpot, and other CRMs on its paid tiers, auto-pushing notes and summaries to the right contact or deal. This is its standout strength.
- Unlimited transcription on paid plans. Pro and Business users get meeting transcription with no monthly limit for the meeting bot or Chrome extension.
- AskFred and conversation intelligence. Fred is Fireflies’ AI assistant: ask questions across your meetings, and get topic tracking and team analytics that are genuinely useful for sales coaching.
- Broad capture surfaces. Beyond the bot, Fireflies offers iOS and Android apps that record in-person meetings, a desktop app (no-bot notetaking for Zoom, Meet, Teams, and Slack Huddles), and a Chrome extension (Google Meet without a bot).
- Language support. English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Italian, plus 100+ other languages in beta.
Where Fireflies.ai falls short
- A confusing credits system. AI features like AskFred draw on a pool of AI credits. On the free plan that is 20 credits, one-time per account, not monthly; shared across the team; extra credits start at 50 credits for $5/month.
- Free-plan storage cap. The Free plan stores 400 min per team and has no video capture, so a team fills it quickly unless it upgrades.
- Per-seat, team-first pricing. Fireflies is priced and designed around teams. For a single person who just wants their own notes, the seat-based tiers can feel like overkill.
- No phone calls or watch app. Fireflies has no way to record a regular phone call between two people (dialer integrations can feed recordings in), and no watch app.
Fireflies.ai pricing in 2026
Fireflies has four tiers. These are the prices on Fireflies’ pricing page when we checked (annual billing saves up to 44%); confirm on Fireflies’ site:
- Free: 400 min per team of storage, 20 one-time AI credits, no video capture.
- Pro: $10 a seat per month billed annually ($18 month-to-month), 8,000 min per seat of storage.
- Business: $19 a seat per month billed annually ($29 month-to-month), unlimited storage.
- Enterprise: $39 a seat per month billed annually, with 1080p video and advanced controls.
How Wave compares
Wave covers the bot workflow Fireflies users know — a calendar assistant that joins Zoom, Google Meet, and Teams — but is built for the individual first and keeps the model simple:
- No credits to decode. Speaker labels, AI summaries, action items, and ask-Wave chat come with every recording — there’s no separate pool of AI credits to ration.
- Phone calls with real caller ID. Wave’s Phone Bridge records both sides of incoming and outgoing calls on iPhone and Android on every plan (Free minutes are shared; Pro is unlimited), showing your real number.
- No-bot desktop capture and watch apps. The Wave desktop app on Mac and Windows records mic and system audio without a bot, and you can start a recording from your wrist on Apple Watch or Wear OS.
- Saved, searchable, and connectable. Every recording is stored and replayable next to its transcript, Voice ID labels speakers across sessions, and an MCP server lets Claude and ChatGPT query your library.
The honest trade-off: if your team lives in a CRM and you want notes auto-synced into Salesforce or HubSpot with company-wide conversation analytics, Fireflies’ integration depth is hard to beat and Wave is lighter there. Wave’s free plan includes 30 minutes of recording per month; paid is $15 a month, or $80 a year, for unlimited recording. For the full breakdown, see Wave vs Fireflies.ai.
Pros and cons at a glance
| Strengths | Limitations |
|---|---|
| CRM integrations incl. Salesforce, HubSpot | Confusing AI-credits system |
| Bot, desktop, Chrome, and mobile capture | 400-min storage per team on free plan |
| AskFred + conversation intelligence | Per-seat pricing aimed at teams |
| Video recording on paid plans | No phone-call recording |
The verdict
Fireflies.ai is a strong pick for sales and ops teams that want every conversation flowing into a CRM with analytics on top — few tools match its integration depth. It’s a heavier fit for an individual who just wants clean personal notes without decoding a credits system or paying per seat. If that’s you, try Wave’s free plan and see whether the simpler model suits you better.
