yapyap vs Meetily. Same local idea, different job.
Meetily showed local meeting notes can work at scale: Rust, Whisper/Parakeet, Ollama, bot-free, Mac and Windows. yapyap is for when one recording must become many views you can share, and when you capture on your phone. It is also for when the same people must be recognized across sessions — not only a notepad after the call.
How we compare
We judge meeting notetakers on five questions: does the tape stay on hardware you control by default; does anything join the call as a guest bot; can one recording become several write-ups (lenses); do speaker names persist across sessions; and is the core price a seat you rent or a tool you own. We are the makers of yapyap — read the side-by-side as a clear product argument, then verify competitor packaging on their own sites before you buy.
- Local-first default: audio and transcripts do not require a cloud account to work.
- Empty guest list: capture from your device, not a bot invite.
- Lenses: reusable views of one recording (summary, actions, quotes, or your own).
- Speaker identity across sessions on your machine.
- Pricing model: pay-once core (€69) vs subscription or seat fees — confirm current vendor prices on their pages.
Background on on-device speech recognition: whisper.cpp is the open stack many local tools build on. For call-host privacy expectations, start from the vendor’s own help (for example Zoom’s security and privacy resources).
Which should you pick?
- Lenses: reusable views of one recording you can share with others.
- Companion phone → desk handoff with no clip-on gadget.
- Speakers you recognize across meetings and interviews.
- €69 once for the core, not an annual Pro seat.
- You want free MIT Community (or their large local community) today.
- Windows GPU / Pro packaging is what you already prefer.
- A local notepad with summary templates is enough. No companion needed.
Side by side
| Dimension | yapyap | Meetily |
|---|---|---|
| Runs on your computer | Yes, notes stay with you | Yes, Community + Pro, 100% local story |
| No meeting bot | Yes | Yes |
| Shareable lenses | Built for this | Custom summary templates (personal, not share-first) |
| Phone companion | Yes | Desktop-first (Mac / Windows) |
| Who spoke | Named people across sessions | Speaker diarization on Pro (as of July 2026) |
| How you pay | €69 once for the core | Free Community · Pro $120/user/year (1 device) |
What Meetily costs over five years
Every app here records a meeting and writes it up. Five years of that, for one person, at the cheapest plan that unlocks the product. Only one of the bills ever ends.
yapyap
€69
· €69 once, every future version included
Stop paying: Nothing. There is no licence to renew and no server to check in with — the copy you bought keeps recording, transcribing and writing.
Otter
$500
· Pro $8.33/user/month billed yearly ($16.99 monthly)
Stop paying: You drop to 300 minutes a month, 30 minutes per conversation, and your notes stay in their cloud.
Meetily
$600
· Free MIT Community · Pro $120/user/year, one device per licence
Stop paying: Speaker names, enhanced models and PDF/DOCX export switch off and the app falls back to free Community. Local, but rented.
Fireflies
$600
· Pro $10/seat/month billed yearly ($18 monthly)
Stop paying: The team drops to 400 minutes of storage, and a bot has been sitting in your meetings the whole time.
Plaud
$659
· Recorder from $159, then Pro cloud minutes at $99.99/year
Stop paying: You fall back to 300 cloud minutes a month. The device still records; turning that recording into words is the part you rent.
Prices as each vendor published them, July 2026. Bars compare the printed figures; currencies are not converted, and packaging changes — check the vendor’s own page before you buy. Ours is on the pricing page.
What Meetily actually ships
As of July 2026: Community Edition is free under MIT with local transcription and summaries. Pro is $10/user/month billed yearly at $120 (early-bird vs a $25/mo list) with speaker diarization, enhanced models, custom model connectors, auto-detect meetings, and PDF/DOCX/Markdown exports. Enterprise is custom (volume and deployment help, with SSO on the roadmap). Calendar/chat features still read as “Soon” on their materials.
Where the jobs diverge
If you only need a free local notepad after meetings, Meetily is a fair pick, often the right one. yapyap aims at a different job: one recording that becomes many views, capture away from the desk, and an archive for interviews you will quote later.
Looking for a Meetily alternative?
Both run on your own machine, so privacy is not the reason to move. The reason is the job. Move when one recording has to become several write-ups other people can reuse, when you record away from your desk, or when the same voices must be recognised across sessions.
Keep Meetily if the free Community edition or their Pro packaging fits as-is, or if you prefer their Windows GPU path today.
What switching actually involves
- New recordings start local from the first one. There is no migration to finish first.
- Old audio files can come with you: yapyap imports recordings you already have.
- Old transcripts cannot. Export those from your current tool if they matter to you.
- Cancel the old seat when you are ready. Nothing here needs the other tool disabled.
FAQ
- Is Meetily free?
- Yes. Community Edition is free and open source (MIT). Pro is $120 per user per year as of July 2026 and unlocks diarisation and advanced exports.
- Does Meetily support speaker diarisation?
- Pro lists speaker diarisation (“who said what”) as included as of July 2026. yapyap focuses on recognising the same people across sessions on your archive, not only labelling turns in one meeting.
- Why choose yapyap over Meetily Pro?
- Choose yapyap for shareable lenses, phone-to-desktop handoff, and speaker identity that persists across sessions. Meetily remains an excellent free local peer if you only need a stronger notepad.
When to pick Meetily instead
yapyap is not for everyone. Choose Meetily if:
- You want free MIT Community (or their large local community) today.
- Windows GPU / Pro packaging is what you already prefer.
- A local notepad with summary templates is enough. No companion needed.
Record your meetings. See who spoke. Turn one recording into the write-up you need, on your computer, with no cloud account.
Free to try. No card, no account.
Then €69, once. Yours forever, every update included.
Your recordings never leave your computer.