Buzz: Popular open-source desktop app that transcribes and translates audio offline on your own computer using OpenAI's Whisper. MiaRec: MiaRec is an AI-powered call recording, transcription, and conversation intelligence platform for contact centers. Here's where each one pulls ahead on pricing, features, and the meetings it suits best.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist Buzz when transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline matters most, and MiaRec when compliance teams recording and redacting calls to meet pci/pii/phi requirements 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.
MiaRec is an AI-powered call recording, transcription, and conversation intelligence platform for contact centers.
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
MiaRec is a contact center intelligence platform built around compliant call recording, automatic speech-to-text transcription, and AI-driven conversation analytics. It captures voice interactions and can transcribe up to 100% of calls, automatically detecting and transcribing multiple languages within a single conversation. From those transcripts it generates structured call summaries, sentiment scores, and topic tags, and powers automated quality management (Auto QA) that evaluates interactions instead of relying on manual sampling. The platform also offers customer experience and revenue intelligence, screen recording, live monitoring, and automatic redaction of sensitive data such as card numbers, SSNs, and emails to support PCI DSS and PII/PHI compliance. It includes role-based access control, multi-tenant architecture, customizable retention policies, and API integration, and provides a tested integration for capturing Microsoft Teams contact center and back-office calls. MiaRec is aimed at contact center leaders, quality and compliance teams, sales managers, and customer service operations that need full visibility into recorded conversations rather than ad hoc sampling.
Best suited for
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); MiaRec is custom pricing (contact sales). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | Buzz | MiaRec |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Offline transcription and translation using OpenAI's Whisper | Automatic speech-to-text transcription of up to 100% of calls with multi-language detection |
| Standout feature | Real-time transcription from microphone input | AI-generated call summaries, sentiment scoring, and topic/conversation tagging |
| Team usage | Speaker identification and speech separation for noisy audio | Automated quality management (Auto QA) that evaluates every interaction |
| Integrations | Exports to TXT, SRT, and VTT | Automatic redaction of sensitive data (card numbers, SSNs, emails) for PCI/PII/PHI compliance |
| Languages & capture | Watch folder for automatic transcription and a command-line interface | Live call monitoring and screen recording |
| Best-fit workflow | GPU acceleration via CUDA, Apple Silicon, and Vulkan | Microsoft Teams integration plus API access, multi-tenant architecture, and role-based access control |
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.
MiaRec
Choose MiaRec if you need contact centers transcribing and analyzing customer calls for quality assurance and coaching — strengths include transcribes and analyzes the full volume of calls rather than relying on manual sampling.
Buzz
MiaRec
It depends on your workflow. Buzz is strong for transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline, while MiaRec is strong for contact centers transcribing and analyzing customer calls for quality assurance and coaching. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades and MiaRec is custom pricing. Check each vendor's pricing page for the latest plans and free-tier limits.
Often yes: teams combine tools when one handles capture and another handles analysis.
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