Buzz: Popular open-source desktop app that transcribes and translates audio offline on your own computer using OpenAI's Whisper. Maier Huiji: Chinese AI meeting and office assistant from AISpeech offering real-time recording, transcription, and AI summaries. The right pick comes down to team size, budget, and the workflows you want to automate.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist Buzz when transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline matters most, and Maier Huiji when recording and reviewing online courses and lectures matters most. Try them side by side on real calls before deciding — needs vary by team.
Popular open-source desktop app that transcribes and translates audio offline on your own computer using OpenAI's Whisper.
Chinese AI meeting and office assistant from AISpeech offering real-time recording, transcription, and AI summaries.
Buzz is a widely used open-source desktop application that transcribes and translates audio offline on the user's personal computer, powered by OpenAI's Whisper. It is MIT-licensed and actively maintained, with v1.4.4 released in March 2026, and it has grown a large community with roughly 19.7k GitHub stars. Buzz runs on macOS, Windows, and Linux, with installation options including Flatpak, Snap, and PyPI. It supports both importing existing audio and video files and real-time transcription from microphone input, and it can export results in formats such as TXT, SRT, and VTT for subtitling and documentation. The app includes an advanced transcript viewer with search and playback controls, a watch folder for automatically transcribing new files, and a command-line interface for automation. It offers GPU acceleration through CUDA for Nvidia cards, Apple Silicon support, and Vulkan for many other GPUs, which makes faster transcription practical even on laptops. Buzz also provides speaker identification and speech separation for noisy audio, plus a plugin system that adds capabilities like AI-generated summaries. Because all processing happens locally, recordings and transcripts remain on the user's machine rather than being uploaded to a cloud service. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Maier Huiji (麦耳会记) is an AI office and meeting assistant developed by AISpeech (思必驰科技股份有限公司), a Chinese intelligent speech and language technology company. The product is built on AISpeech's full-stack conversational speech technology and is designed for office meetings, online classes, interviews, and client conversations. It records and transcribes speech in real time, letting users capture key information as a conversation happens, and synchronizes audio and text across PC and mobile through cloud storage so notes can be reviewed anywhere. Transcription supports Mandarin, Cantonese, Sichuanese, and English, and the system can automatically distinguish between different speakers. Beyond live capture, it transcribes uploaded audio and video files, generates AI full-text summaries, supports AI-assisted writing, records remote meetings, and provides real-time caption translation. Higher-tier features such as AI summaries, key-point extraction, and to-do generation require a membership. The product also integrates with AISpeech's own AI microphone speakers (such as the M4, M6, and M12) for directional pickup and noise reduction to improve recording clarity and transcription accuracy. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); Maier Huiji is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | Buzz | Maier Huiji |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Offline transcription and translation using OpenAI's Whisper | Real-time recording with live speech-to-text transcription |
| Standout feature | Real-time transcription from microphone input | Transcription of uploaded audio and video files |
| Team usage | Speaker identification and speech separation for noisy audio | AI full-text summaries and key-point extraction |
| Integrations | Exports to TXT, SRT, and VTT | Automatic speaker separation |
| Languages & capture | Watch folder for automatic transcription and a command-line interface | Multi-language transcription including Mandarin, Cantonese, Sichuanese, and English |
| Best-fit workflow | GPU acceleration via CUDA, Apple Silicon, and Vulkan | Real-time caption translation and remote meeting recording |
Buzz
Choose Buzz if you need transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline — strengths include fully offline so audio and transcripts stay on the user's computer.
Maier Huiji
Choose Maier Huiji if you need capturing and summarizing internal and remote business meetings — strengths include backed by aispeech, an established chinese speech-technology company.
Buzz
Maier Huiji
It depends on your workflow. Buzz is strong for transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline, while Maier Huiji is strong for capturing and summarizing internal and remote business meetings. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades and Maier Huiji 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.
More head-to-head comparisons involving Buzz and Maier Huiji.
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