Dscout: Experience research platform for moderated interviews, diary studies, and usability testing with AI transcription, themes, and analysis. Shadow: A bot-free, Mac-based AI meeting assistant that transcribes and summarizes calls locally without joining as a participant. Here's where each one pulls ahead on pricing, features, and the meetings it suits best.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist Dscout when running and transcribing moderated user interviews matters most, and Shadow when privacy-conscious teams that prefer on-device transcription matters most. Run both through a week of actual calls to see which suits your workflow.
Experience research platform for moderated interviews, diary studies, and usability testing with AI transcription, themes, and analysis.
A bot-free, Mac-based AI meeting assistant that transcribes and summarizes calls locally without joining as a participant.
Dscout is an experience research platform that pairs human participant feedback with AI tools to help teams gather and analyze qualitative insights at scale. It supports a range of research methods, including live and uploaded moderated interviews, usability testing with heat maps and task success metrics, real-time site intercepts, field studies, diary studies with multiple activities, and media-rich surveys. For interviews, Dscout simplifies scheduling across time zones, integrates incentives, supports observers, and can capture both a participant's face and screen, and it also offers an AI Moderator that can autonomously guide participants, seek clarification, and capture feedback. On the analysis side, Dscout provides automated transcription, AI-generated summaries of open-ended and video responses, AI-generated themes presented as smart tags for pattern identification, and surfacing of notable moments that highlight strong opinions or surprising insights. Teams can recruit from Dscout's verified Scout participant pool or bring their own audience. Known historically for mobile and in-context research, Dscout positions itself as an AI-native platform that helps researchers capture high-fidelity feedback and move quickly from raw sessions to organized, analyzable insights. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Shadow is a bot-free AI meeting assistant for macOS that captures meetings by listening to your computer's audio in the background rather than joining the call as a visible participant. Because transcription runs locally on the Mac, the audio does not need to leave the device for that core processing step, which the company positions as a privacy advantage. Shadow can automatically detect when a meeting starts, transcribe the conversation with speaker identification, and turn the discussion into structured notes, summaries, and follow-up items. It also captures on-screen content alongside the spoken audio, so material shared during a call (slides, dashboards, or shared windows) can be reflected in the output. The tool works across common conferencing platforms including Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, Webex, Slack, and Discord. Users can configure customizable prompts (described as Skills) to generate notes, summaries, or drafted emails, and connect outputs to other tools via webhooks. It is aimed at professionals and teams who want meeting capture without adding another bot to the call. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Dscout is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); Shadow is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | Dscout | Shadow |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Moderated live and uploaded video interviews with observer support | Bot-free capture that records system audio without joining the meeting as a participant |
| Standout feature | AI Moderator that dynamically guides participants and captures feedback | On-device (local) transcription on macOS |
| Team usage | Automated transcription of interviews and responses | Speaker identification during transcription |
| Integrations | AI-generated summaries of open-ended and video responses | Captures on-screen content in addition to spoken audio |
| Languages & capture | AI-generated themes as smart tags and surfaced notable moments | Customizable prompts/Skills to generate notes, summaries, and emails |
| Best-fit workflow | Diary studies, usability testing, intercepts, and media-rich surveys | Webhook integration to connect outputs to other tools |
Dscout
Choose Dscout if you need running and transcribing moderated user interviews — strengths include supports many research methods beyond interviews in one platform.
Shadow
Choose Shadow if you need capturing notes and summaries across multiple conferencing platforms without a bot joining — strengths include does not add a visible bot to meetings.
Dscout
Shadow
It depends on your workflow. Dscout is strong for running and transcribing moderated user interviews, while Shadow is strong for capturing notes and summaries across multiple conferencing platforms without a bot joining. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
Dscout is a free tier with paid upgrades and Shadow 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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