noScribe and ownscribe are both AI meeting assistants for recording, transcription, and summaries, compared here on pricing, features, and workflow fit. noScribe: Free, open-source desktop transcriber that runs Whisper and pyannote fully locally with speaker identification and a synchronized editor. ownscribe: Local-first command-line tool that records, transcribes, and summarizes meetings on macOS entirely on-device, with natural-language search across notes. They overlap on ai-meeting-assistants, so the right pick depends on team size, budget, and which meeting workflows you automate.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
For ai-meeting-assistants workflows, shortlist noScribe when researchers transcribing qualitative interviews while keeping data on their own machine matters most, and ownscribe when developers capturing and summarizing meetings from the terminal on a mac matters most. Both record across Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams; trial each on real meetings before committing.
Free, open-source desktop transcriber that runs Whisper and pyannote fully locally with speaker identification and a synchronized editor.
Local-first command-line tool that records, transcribes, and summarizes meetings on macOS entirely on-device, with natural-language search across notes.
noScribe is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); ownscribe is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | noScribe | ownscribe |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Fully local transcription using Whisper via faster-whisper | Local-first recording, transcription, and summarization via CLI |
| Standout feature | Speaker diarization with pyannote (automatic or manual speaker counts) | System audio capture on macOS 14.2+ through Core Audio |
| Team usage | Support for around 60 languages | WhisperX transcription with word-level timestamps |
| Integrations | Synchronized companion editor (noScribeEdit) with playback follow-along | Optional speaker diarization via PyAnnote |
| Languages & capture | Batch transcription, pause detection, and experimental overlapping-speech detection | Local summarization with a built-in Phi-4-mini model, plus Ollama and OpenAI-compatible backends |
| Best-fit workflow | Exports to HTML, VTT, and TXT plus a command-line interface | Natural-language search across meeting notes with the ask command |
noScribe
Choose noScribe if you need researchers transcribing qualitative interviews while keeping data on their own machine — strengths include runs 100% locally to keep sensitive recordings confidential.
ownscribe
Choose ownscribe if you need developers capturing and summarizing meetings from the terminal on a mac — strengths include runs entirely on-device with no data sent to external servers.
noScribe
ownscribe
It depends on your workflow. noScribe is strong for researchers transcribing qualitative interviews while keeping data on their own machine, while ownscribe is strong for developers capturing and summarizing meetings from the terminal on a mac. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
noScribe is a free tier with paid upgrades and ownscribe 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 and the budget is justified.