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. Notewise: Handwriting and PDF note-taking app for Apple devices with AI audio transcription for lectures and meetings. The right pick comes down to team size, budget, and the workflows you want to automate.
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 Notewise when annotating course pdfs and slides with synced audio matters most. Trial each on a few real meetings before you commit — the better fit usually shows fast.
A 100% local, no-bot meeting recorder for Mac and iOS that records, transcribes, and summarizes entirely on-device, built by the BuildBetter team.
Handwriting and PDF note-taking app for Apple devices with AI audio transcription for lectures and meetings.
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
Notewise is a note-taking app for iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Vision Pro that combines handwritten notes and PDF annotation with AI features for students and other learners. It offers low-latency handwriting with palm rejection, multiple pen and highlighter styles, shape and table tools, and image insertion, alongside PDF markup and annotation. Its AI capabilities include audio transcription that turns lectures, meetings, and memos into text, with the transcription synced to the moment in your handwritten notes so you can tap a note and hear what was being said. Notewise also provides handwriting OCR across more than 20 languages, letting users search across handwriting, typed notes, audio transcripts, and PDFs in one place. Additional AI tools include a chat interface to query your notes, context-aware question answering on highlighted content, and auto-generated audio summaries of notes. Real-time collaboration in shared notebooks and cloud sync across devices round out the feature set. Notewise is well suited to students who take handwritten lecture notes on an iPad and want recorded audio transcribed and tied back to what they wrote, with export to PDF and other formats. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
BB Recorder is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); Notewise is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | BB Recorder | Notewise |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | No-bot capture of system audio directly on the device | AI audio transcription of lectures and meetings synced to handwritten notes |
| Standout feature | Fully on-device recording, transcription, and summarization | Low-latency handwriting with palm rejection plus PDF annotation |
| Team usage | Local AI chat to ask questions about a captured meeting | Handwriting OCR across more than 20 languages with unified search |
| Integrations | Calendar linking to associate recordings with scheduled meetings | AI chat to query notes and context-aware Q&A on highlighted content |
| Languages & capture | Available for macOS and iOS | Auto-generated audio summaries of notes |
| Best-fit workflow | Built by the BuildBetter team with an AI transparency policy | Real-time collaboration in shared notebooks and cross-device cloud sync |
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.
Notewise
Choose Notewise if you need handwriting lecture notes on an ipad while recording and transcribing class audio — strengths include ties lecture audio transcription directly to the moment in handwritten notes.
BB Recorder
Notewise
It depends on your workflow. BB Recorder is strong for regulated or privacy-sensitive teams that cannot send audio to the cloud, while Notewise is strong for handwriting lecture notes on an ipad while recording and transcribing class audio. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
BB Recorder is a free tier with paid upgrades and Notewise is a free tier with paid upgrades. Check each vendor's pricing page for the latest plans and free-tier limits.
Yes. Many teams run more than one meeting assistant when the workflows are complementary.
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