BB Recorder: A 100% local, no-bot meeting recorder for Mac and iOS that records, transcribes, and summarizes entirely on-device, built by the BuildBetter team. Empathia AI: Empathia AI is an ambient AI medical scribe that records patient encounters and automatically generates clinical notes, letters, and billing codes for clinicians. Which one wins depends on your platform mix, budget, and how hands-off you want notes to be.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist BB Recorder when regulated or privacy-sensitive teams that cannot send audio to the cloud matters most, and Empathia AI when generating referral letters, consult letters, and patient instructions from recorded visits matters most. Test each on your own meetings; the right choice tends to become obvious quickly.
A 100% local, no-bot meeting recorder for Mac and iOS that records, transcribes, and summarizes entirely on-device, built by the BuildBetter team.
Empathia AI is an ambient AI medical scribe that records patient encounters and automatically generates clinical notes, letters, and billing codes for clinicians.
BB Recorder is a local-first meeting recorder built by the team behind BuildBetter, designed for people who want meeting capture without any data leaving their device. Rather than dropping a bot into a video call, BB Recorder captures the computer's system audio directly, links to the user's calendar, and turns rough conversation audio into clean transcripts and summaries. Its defining characteristic is that recording, transcription, summarization, and even live AI chat about the meeting can all run locally using on-device models, so there is no server holding the audio or transcripts. The company frames this as making a data breach architecturally impossible because there is no cloud store to compromise, and it points to SOC 2 and HIPAA considerations along with an AI transparency policy. BB Recorder is positioned as a genuinely free, unlimited option for Mac, with no trial tiers or required registration when using local models, and a companion iOS app extends capture to the iPhone. It is aimed at privacy-sensitive professionals, regulated teams, and anyone who wants automatic meeting notes without a visible bot or a cloud transcription pipeline. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Empathia AI is an AI medical scribe built for clinicians and healthcare practices. Its core engine, EMMA, uses ambient AI to listen to doctor-patient interactions across in-person visits, telehealth, and phone calls, then transcribes the conversation and generates structured, customizable clinical notes. Beyond note-taking, it produces chart summaries, referral and consult letters, form autofill, patient instructions, and suggested ICD/CPT/service billing codes. The platform supports multi-speaker conversations, dictation, and multilingual encounters, and offers specialty-tuned templates across 20+ medical specialties. It works on desktop and mobile and integrates with numerous EMR/EHR systems, including Epic, Athenahealth, eClinicalWorks, NextGen, DrChrono, Practice Fusion, Elation, and Canadian systems such as Accuro, OSCAR, and Juno. Empathia emphasizes compliance, citing HIPAA, PHIPA, PIPEDA, and GDPR alignment, and notes pre-qualified vendor status with Canada Health Infoway's national AI scribe program. It targets individual practitioners and clinics seeking to reduce documentation time and refocus attention on patient care.
Best suited for
BB Recorder is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); Empathia AI is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | BB Recorder | Empathia AI |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | No-bot capture of system audio directly on the device | Ambient AI capture (EMMA) for in-person, telehealth, and phone encounters |
| Standout feature | Fully on-device recording, transcription, and summarization | Automatic transcription and structured clinical note generation |
| Team usage | Local AI chat to ask questions about a captured meeting | Multi-speaker and multilingual support with dictation |
| Integrations | Calendar linking to associate recordings with scheduled meetings | Specialty-tuned templates across 20+ medical specialties |
| Languages & capture | Available for macOS and iOS | Suggested ICD/CPT/service billing codes, referral and consult letters |
| Best-fit workflow | Built by the BuildBetter team with an AI transparency policy | EMR/EHR integrations (Epic, Athenahealth, eClinicalWorks, Accuro, OSCAR, and more) |
BB Recorder
Choose BB Recorder if you need regulated or privacy-sensitive teams that cannot send audio to the cloud — strengths include local-only processing keeps meeting audio and transcripts off external servers.
Empathia AI
Choose Empathia AI if you need clinicians automating post-visit charting and clinical note documentation — strengths include purpose-built for clinical documentation with deep emr integration.
BB Recorder
Empathia AI
It depends on your workflow. BB Recorder is strong for regulated or privacy-sensitive teams that cannot send audio to the cloud, while Empathia AI is strong for clinicians automating post-visit charting and clinical note documentation. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
BB Recorder is a free tier with paid upgrades and Empathia AI is a free tier with paid upgrades. Check each vendor's pricing page for the latest plans and free-tier limits.
You can — some teams pair them when each covers a different part of the meeting workflow.
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