If you’re looking for a tool that can record, transcribe, and provide juicy AI insights into your online meetings, Fathom is one of the best in the business. However, it’s not everyone’s cup of tea. That’s why there are so many Fathom alternatives, some that offer even more bang for your buck than Fathom does.
What’s certain: with 83% of employees spending up to 1/3 of their workweek in meetings, something needs to change. This article will discuss which tools are available for you to save time and energy in a hectic meeting schedule, but also maximize the meetings you do attend.
We’ll start with a complete Fathom review for 2024, and then dive into some Fathom alternatives if it doesn’t sound like it’s right for you. If you’ve already tested Fathom and concluded that you want something better, feel free to jump straight to the competitors.
What is Fathom?
Fathom is a powerful AI meeting assistant that intends to make your life easier by taking notes in your meetings and summarizing them on your behalf. For each meeting you have, you’ll get an overview of all the topics discussed with timestamps that let you jump straight to the relevant moment.
What’s great about Fathom is that individuals get to use it for free. That’s right: nothing, nada, zilch. For these lucky people using it outside of work, they’ll get unlimited video recordings and transcripts, but it does lack the more complex AI features. For that, users need Fathom Premium.
As a top transcription tool, Fathom quickly and automatically creates summaries of meetings, ram-packed with action items, questions asked, and key topics. This empowers you to make decisions much faster. Gone are the days where you’d need to rewatch the entire meeting to get up to speed.
A great feature of Fathom’s is the ability to have real-time live transcriptions. This can be a time-saver as it enables you to take notes on the go. Fathom is also great for collaborating, allowing you to share your meeting notes across popular documentation tools like Google Docs, Notion, or Asana in lightning speed – even when you’re still mid-call. That’s not all; it has plenty more integrations that are designed to automate your workflows, from CRM systems to sales tools.
Let’s get granular. What are the pros and cons of using Fathom?
Fathom Pros
- Automatic Summaries. Fathom automatically generates summaries of meetings, including action items.
- Easily Shareable Reels. With Fathom, you can create short video clips and share them in a single click.
- Powerful AI. Generate highlights mid-call and then get Fathom’s AI to summarize them on the go.
- Download Instantly. Meetings and transcripts are available to download instantly.
- Good Free Options. It’s free for personal use and has a 2 week free trial for the team version.
Fathom Cons
- Compatibility. Fathom is only available with Zoom, MS Teams, and Google Meet.
- Limited Translations. Only available in 6 languages.
- Complicated Pricing. The pricing structure for Fathom is a little unusual.
- No Sales Coaching. There are no features to help sales teams close more deals.
- No Multi-Meeting Intelligence. Fathom doesn’t offer insights across multiple meetings at once.
Pricing
Fathom is free for personal use. If you aren’t sure whether or not it’s for you, the free option provides the perfect opportunity to test it out.
For use in teams, Fathom requires you to get a paid subscription. There is a free 14-day trial for this plan so you can see how it works with your team, too. The paid plan starts at $50 per month and is priced on an unusual “per company” basis.
Is Fathom Worth It?
It really depends on what you need. Fathom is good at what it does, so if you only need a tool to record, transcribe, and summarize meetings, it’s well worth a download to see if you like it.
However, there are dozens of Fathom alternatives that provide even better features. These are particularly important to consider if you’re aiming to use Fathom for a specific purpose, like for sales calls for example.
It’s also worth noting that Fathom’s translation languages are rather slim, making it a weaker tool for multilingual or international teams.
Let’s take a look at some of Fathom’s strongest competitors and see how they fare against each other.
Top 3 Fathom Alternatives
1. tl;dv
tl;dv, which stands for “too long; didn’t view”, does the vast majority of what Fathom does, but it has more specialized features and costs less. Sound like a no-brainer? It just might be.
For starters, tl;dv’s free plan includes unlimited video recordings, transcripts, and AI moment summaries so you can try it out to your heart’s content before committing to pay for the more specialized features. The free plan also integrates with emails, Slack, and your calendar too.
So if it does all this for free, what do you get for paying? 🤔
Glad you asked. tl;dv provides cutting edge sales coaching features, making it the ideal tool for sales managers that are looking to improve sales team performance and close more deals. As tl;dv’s AI records, transcribes, and scrutinizes your meetings for insights, it provides tips for objection handling so your sales reps can flip doubts into conviction.
What’s more, tl;dv provides multi-meeting intelligence so that managers can receive recurring reports on any topic they want within predefined parameters. For sales managers, this means you can get weekly reports that provide an overview of how all your sales reps performed a given task. You could monitor how they handle specific objections, in which case you’ll receive reports that focus only on that exact objection, with timestamps for you to jump to specific moments from multiple different meetings that occurred within the timeframe of the report. For managers, this tool is a godsend.
Keep in mind that objection handling was just an example too. This can be used by customer success teams to identify calls about a specific problem, internal product discussions to monitor progress with a new feature, or user research teams to quickly find common ground across all your user interviews.
tl;dv’s sales coaching features don’t stop there though. It also provides template playbooks like BANT or MEDDIC for you to use and a dashboard to monitor your sales team’s performance, including specific factors like a sales rep’s talk time. You can even create your own custom playbooks and use scorecards to assess each individual sales rep.
If this wasn’t enough, tl;dv has more than 5,000 integrations which are all made available in the Pro Plan for just $19 per month.
Don’t forget, tl;dv can record and transcribe meetings concurrently too. What this means is that if you’re part of the 78% of people who feel like their meeting schedule is overloaded, you can cut back on your time in meetings and catch up later.
tl;dv Pros
- Free AI Integration: tl;dv capitalizes on top-of-the-range AI to provide summaries, notes, and automatic speaker detection.
- Free and Instant Translations: tl;dv’s transcriptions are available in more than 40 languages for Zoom, MS Teams, and Google Meet.
- Incredible Free Plan: Unlimited free video recordings and transcriptions of Zoom, MS Teams, and Google Meet calls.
- Easy to Use: tl;dv’s sleek design makes it super easy for beginners and experts alike.
- Multi-Meeting Intelligence. Schedule recurring reports to get insights from multiple meetings at once, delivered straight to your inbox.
- Sales Coaching. Upgrade your sales team using insights from your sales calls. Improve objection handling and use templates or custom playbooks to personalize your coaching strategy.
- Timestamps and Tagging Features: Timestamp your meeting highlights to quickly jump back to specific moments in the call. It also features the ability to tag colleagues at specific meeting moments so they get an email with a link straight to their inbox.
- 5,000+ Integrations: Push timestamps and meeting clips directly to Notion, Slack, HubSpot, Salesforce, and 5,000+ more via native integrations.
- Create Clips and Highlights: Scan your library and make clips and highlight reels to condense insights.
- Intuitive Library: Search your meetings library for keywords in transcripts to quickly find what you’re looking for.
- Concurrent Meetings. tl;dv’s AI can record and transcribe multiple meetings at the same time, making your life easier if you’re double (or triple+) booked.
tl;dv Cons
- Compatibility: Not yet available for Webex or BlueJeans.
Pricing
tl;dv’s features speak for themselves, but its free plan is the primary reason it’s the best of these Fathom alternatives. You can try it out today with no strings attached. Plus, depending on which region of the world you’re in, you can get up to a 40% discount on the paid plans!
Free Plan Features
- Unlimited video recordings and transcripts.
- Record Google Meet, Zoom, and MS Teams calls.
- Transcribe in 40+ languages
- Unlimited AI moment summaries
- 10x AI Meeting Notes
- 10x Ask tl;dv AI
- 10x AI Multi-Meeting Reports
- Slack, Email, and Calendar integrations
- Set timestamps and highlights
- Create and share clips
- Automatic speaker recognition
- 3 monthly uploads
tl;dv’s paid subscriptions unlock 5,000+ integrations, sales coaching playbooks, limitless multi-meeting intelligence, recurring reports, analytics, downloadable recordings, customizable share settings, priority customer support, and much, much more.
See the full details here.
tl;dv vs Fathom
The best way to sum it up is like this: tl;dv can do almost everything that Fathom can do, but Fathom can’t do anywhere near as much as tl;dv can do.
Sure, Fathom has one main advantage over tl;dv: it can transcribe your meetings in real-time. But tl;dv has countless advantages over Fathom:
- Languages. tl;dv translates into 40+ languages and has a localized platform in 7 languages, compared to Fathom’s measly 6 transcription languages and English-only localized platform.
- Multi-Meeting Intelligence. tl;dv’s AI can identify patterns and trends across multiple meetings at once. Fathom’s AI cannot.
- Recurring Reports. tl;dv empowers you to schedule recurring reports across all your team’s meetings. Fathom doesn’t.
- Concurrent Meetings. tl;dv lets you record and transcribe multiple meetings simultaneously. Fathom doesn’t.
- Sales Coaching. tl;dv offers template or custom playbooks, scorecards, objection handling tips, and a sales coaching dashboard. Fathom provides none of the above.
The list could go on forever. In short, tl;dv is the superior tool, and it’s not even close.
For a deep dive into how they compare, see our article, tl;dv vs Fathom.
Fathom got its hype and was coined as the “free notetaker”. We were curious about how it stacked up against tl;dv when used by teams, and were left with a bit of disappointment…
2. Tactiq
Tactiq is one of the leading AI meeting assistants on the market. Just like Fathom, it records, transcribes, and takes notes during your live calls. It also provides real-time transcriptions and insightful AI summaries so that you can get more out of your meetings.
So far so good, it’s already covered all of Fathom’s key features. But Tactiq takes things a step further: it translates into more than 60 languages, supports regional dialects, and automatically removes filler words. It can even perform sentiment analysis, assisting your sales reps by uncovering the emotional weight behind words.
Tactiq has a few great-but-unassuming features. For example, it empowers users to assign tasks based on meeting discussions. This is great for keeping everything clean, tidy, and in one place.
Like the number one Fathom alternative, tl;dv, Tactiq has great admin options, organizational features, and its customer support is known to be quick and efficient. It has a whopping 4.9/5 on ProductHunt, just pipping Fathom’s 4.8 rating.
One thing that potentially lets Tactiq down is its lack of sales coaching or multi-meeting intelligence. It does everything right, but it doesn’t have any industry-leading features to take it higher up the list of Fathom alternatives.
Tactiq Pros
- Real-Time Transcriptions. Tactiq’s transcriptions appear in real-time so you can make notes or share snippets on the go.
- Translations. Tactiq’s transcripts come in more than 60 languages and it has a localized platform in 7 languages, making it great for international teams.
- Great AI Summaries. Tactiq’s AI summarizes meetings, pulling out the most insightful comments for you to rewatch.
- Task Assignment. Tactiq enables users to assign tasks based on the meeting discussions.
- Sentiment Analysis. Tactiq’s AI can determine the emotional tone behind words.
- Efficient Customer Support. Tactiq’s customer support is quick, friendly, and efficient.
Tactiq Cons
- No Sales Coaching. Tactiq suffers in this regard by not being able to use its AI to improve sales.
- No Multi-Meeting Intelligence. Tactiq’s AI is limited to single meeting insights. It’s unable to connect the dots between two or more separate meetings.
- Weak Free Plan. Only 10 meetings are available to be transcribed per month on the free plan, with just 5 AI credits.
- Questionable Compliance. Tactiq doesn’t comment on whether or not it is SOC2 compliant, and its data retention policies are not clearly presented.
- No Concurrent Meetings. Tactiq doesn’t allow users to record more than one meeting at the same time, making it a weaker offering for busy managers.
Tactiq Pricing
Tactiq’s paid offerings start at $8 per month, but don’t be fooled by the low price. This plan unlocks things that tl;dv provides for free: unlimited transcriptions and 10 AI credits per month.
The Team Plan comes in at $16.70 per user per month and allows for unlimited AI credits and priority support. Finally, the Enterprise Plan is customizable and varies in price depending on your needs.
Free Plan Features
- 5 AI credits per month
- 10 transcripts per month
- Share and export transcripts
- Upload meeting recordings
Tactiq’s free plan also allows you to use its core features like global search and edit transcript.
Fathom vs Tactiq
While Fathom is a great tool, Tactiq offers everything that Fathom does and a little bit more. It has a higher rating, cleaner UI, and more affordable pricing structure.
Tactiq has phenomenal language support, something that Fathom severely lacks. Tactiq also enables users to assign tasks, remove filler words automatically, and even detect regional dialects for more accurate transcripts.
While Tactiq triumphs over Fathom, it doesn’t distinguish itself enough to compete with tl;dv’s sales coaching or multi-meeting intelligence. To see how Tactiq squared up against tl;dv, check out our comprehensive comparison: tl;dv vs Tactiq.
We compare tl;dv vs Tactiq: Which meeting management tool excels in recording, security, and coaching, and which is best for transcription and note-taking?
3. Otter.ai
Otter.ai used to be the first name that people thought of when it came to automatic note-taking and transcription. They’ve been beaten to the punch a few times since then, but they’re still one of the biggest players in the game.
The key difference between Otter and Fathom is the format both platforms use to take notes. Fathom, like the other tools on this list, focuses on video and text, while Otter simply relies on English speech-to-text transcription and note-taking. This means that Otter doesn’t have video recording capability at all, something that could potentially be a huge setback.
Otter has recently jumped into the AI bandwagon and released Otter Chat. This powerful tool lets you query one or multiple meetings about pretty much anything. It works in a GPT-style manner, letting you mine for specific insights across multiple meetings at once. However, one drawback is that there’s not an option to select a subset of meetings to prompt about; it’s all or nothing.
You also can’t schedule recurring reports like you can with tl;dv. You can, however, send Otter to transcribe multiple meetings at once (up to 3).
Pros
- Real-Time Transcriptions. Otter provides live captions during Zoom calls.
- AI Prompting. Otter Chat offers AI prompting in single and multiple meetings.
- Collaboration. Multiple people can join the same account to collaborate.
- Custom Vocabulary. Otter enables users to add their own jargon for more accurate transcripts.
- Filler Word Removal. Get clearer transcripts as filler words are automatically removed
Cons
- Language Support. Otter is only available in English.
- No Video. Otter doesn’t offer video support.
- No Regional Dialects. Accents are still a struggle for Otter to comprehend.
- Weak Support Options. No chat support on the free plan.
- Integrations. Otter is compatible with Zoom, Google Meet, and MS Teams. You can also use it with various dialers and hook it up to HubSpot or Salesforce, but that’s about it.
- No Sales Coaching Features. Otter.ai is no good for sales teams hoping to improve their performance as it lacks playbooks, scorecards, dashboards, or insights on improvement.
- No Clips or Reels. Otter doesn’t allow the user to make clips or reels from meeting moments.
Otter Pricing
Otter’s paid plans start at $8.33 per user per month when billed annually. This includes custom vocabulary, but it still limits transcription to 90 minutes per conversation and only 1,200 minutes in total.
The Business Plan costs $20 per user per month, unlocking usage analytics and priority support. This allows you to join up to 3 meetings concurrently and ups the monthly transcription minutes to 6,000.
Finally, the Enterprise Plan requires a sales call to get a quote. It includes SSO and advanced security and compliance controls.
Free Plan Features
- 300 monthly transcription minutes (30 max per conversation)
- 3 imported transcriptions
- 5 terms for custom vocabulary
- Otter AI chat
Otter vs. Fathom
Otter.ai is a speech-to-text transcription software for the English language. Its real-time transcriptions are great for collaborating on the go, and its filler word removal and custom vocabulary features both make the transcripts clean and easy to skim.
Overall, Otter is more likely to churn out a better quality transcript than Fathom. You can transcribe multiple meetings at once, and you can even prompt Otter Chat to get a limited form of multi-meeting intelligence.
However, Fathom has video recording, and despite only having 6 translatable languages, it’s 6x more than Otter has. Fathom also has a better suite of integrations, including Zapier, allowing it to connect with more apps via a third party. Otter lacks a Zapier integration, cutting it off from countless work and productivity apps.
There are pros and cons to both tools. Ultimately, the decision will fall on what you need most: quality transcripts or video and integrations.
We pitted Otter against the number one Fathom alternative on this list, tl;dv. See the detailed breakdown here: tl;dv vs Otter.ai.
Otter got in earlier and got its reputation in the meeting productivity space, but a lot has changed over the past years. We’ve paired it against tl;dv to see how it has stood the test
Fathom Alternatives: The Verdict
Fathom has some good functionality and one of the standout free plans on the market, but do the Fathom alternatives provide more?
In short, yes.
Otter offers cleaner transcripts (with filler word removal and custom vocabulary) but falls short on the language side of things. It also doesn’t offer video recording so Otter is an oddball.
Tactiq, on the other hand, does everything Fathom does, and a little extra for less.
But tl;dv is where Fathom’s fate is sealed. Not only does it exceed Fathom’s great free plan, it also has industry-leading features like multi-meeting intelligence, sales coaching, and scheduled reports.
It’s free to try and definitely worth your time to do so, but ultimately, what you go for will depend on the needs of your team and how much you’re willing to spend. With so many options available, we’re sure there’s something out there that can help meet those needs.
Happy note-taking!
