Ava: AI live captioning and transcription app for accessibility, providing real-time captions for conversations and video meetings. OpenOats: Open-source macOS meeting note-taker that transcribes calls locally and surfaces relevant talking points from your own notes in real time. The right pick comes down to team size, budget, and the workflows you want to automate.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist Ava when real-time captioning for deaf and hard-of-hearing participants matters most, and OpenOats when privately transcribing meetings on a mac without sending audio to the cloud matters most. Trial each on a few real meetings before you commit — the better fit usually shows fast.
AI live captioning and transcription app for accessibility, providing real-time captions for conversations and video meetings.
Open-source macOS meeting note-taker that transcribes calls locally and surfaces relevant talking points from your own notes in real time.
Ava is a live captioning and transcription service built primarily for deaf and hard-of-hearing users, as well as for organizations that need accessible meetings and conversations. The app captures audio from in-person conversations and from video conferencing tools, then generates real-time captions on a phone, computer, or in the meeting interface. Ava combines automatic speech recognition with an optional professional scribe service for higher-accuracy, ADA-compliant captioning, giving users a choice between fast AI captions and human-assisted transcription. Features include color-coded speaker identification so users can follow who said what, support for many languages, and stored transcripts and summaries after a conversation ends. Through its Ava Connect integration, the service connects with Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams, and it is available across mobile (iOS and Android), web, and desktop (Windows and Mac). Ava is aimed at individuals who need accessibility support in daily conversations and meetings, as well as at educational institutions, healthcare providers, corporations, and event venues that must provide compliant real-time captioning without committing to a traditional CART contract. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
OpenOats is an open-source macOS meeting note-taker, created by Yazin Akkawi (the project was previously named OpenGranola before being renamed), that sits alongside your calls and both transcribes the conversation and helps you contribute to it. It captures both sides of a meeting and transcribes audio locally on Apple Silicon so audio never leaves the device, while in real time it searches your own markdown or plain-text knowledge base to surface relevant talking points and things worth saying during the discussion. The application window is hidden from screen sharing by default, which lets it stay private during video calls, and transcripts and session logs are auto-saved locally. OpenOats supports both fully local operation through Ollama and cloud providers such as OpenRouter and Voyage AI, so users can choose between complete offline privacy and hosted models. It is written primarily in Swift, distributed under the MIT license, and actively maintained with very frequent releases. The project documents itself at openoats.com and targets users who want a privacy-respecting, self-hostable alternative to cloud meeting copilots, combining live transcription with a retrieval layer over personal notes rather than only producing an after-the-fact summary. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Ava is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); OpenOats is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | Ava | OpenOats |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Integration with Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams | Real-time local transcription of both sides of a conversation on Apple Silicon |
| Standout feature | Real-time live captions for in-person and online conversations | Live retrieval of relevant talking points from your own notes during meetings |
| Team usage | Color-coded speaker identification | Window hidden from screen sharing by default for privacy on calls |
| Integrations | Optional professional scribe service for higher accuracy | Auto-saved transcripts and session logs to local files |
| Languages & capture | Mobile, web, and desktop apps | Works fully local via Ollama or with cloud models (OpenRouter, Voyage AI) |
| Best-fit workflow | Saved transcripts and conversation summaries | MIT-licensed, self-hostable Swift application |
Ava
Choose Ava if you need real-time captioning for deaf and hard-of-hearing participants — strengths include strong accessibility focus for deaf and hard-of-hearing users.
OpenOats
Choose OpenOats if you need getting live, context-aware prompts from your own notes during sales or customer calls — strengths include local on-device transcription keeps meeting audio private.
Ava
OpenOats
It depends on your workflow. Ava is strong for real-time captioning for deaf and hard-of-hearing participants, while OpenOats is strong for getting live, context-aware prompts from your own notes during sales or customer calls. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
Ava is a free tier with paid upgrades and OpenOats is a free tier with paid upgrades. Check each vendor's pricing page for the latest plans and free-tier limits.
Sure. Running both makes sense when their strengths don't overlap and the budget allows.
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