Trace

Meeting summaries that never leave your Mac.

Trace runs a local speech model entirely on your Mac, with no cloud service and no accounts. It captures microphone audio, system audio and optional screenshots, then hands back a markdown transcript and summary with flagged moments inline. It works over any meeting app (Zoom, Teams, Meet, Slack) via a hotkey, and sessions are stored as plain audio and markdown files on disk.

12 alternatives to Trace

Ranked by how well each tool replaces Trace: shared features, audience, price and popularity.

Tactiq
Focus on the meeting, let AI handle the notes.
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
60 out of 100 match$8/mo
Granola
The AI notepad for back-to-back meetings.
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
59 out of 100 match$14/mo
Otter.ai
AI meeting agent for transcription, summaries and action items
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
58 out of 100 match$16.99/mo
Recall.ai
The API to get transcripts, recordings, and metadata from meetings.
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
57 out of 100 matchUsage-based
Voicenotes
The notetaker for your confidential meetings.
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
57 out of 100 match$9/mo
Grain
The AI Notetaker Built for Growing Teams
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
57 out of 100 match$15/mo
Unblah
A meeting-buddy app that tracks how long you've been speaking and helps you develop a feel
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
57 out of 100 matchContact sales
Bluedot
Bot-free AI note taker for online and in-person meetings
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
56 out of 100 match$14/mo
Fathom
AI meeting notetaker that records and summarizes calls
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
55 out of 100 match$19/mo
Sally
AI meeting assistant that transcribes meetings, creates summaries and transfers notes
Covers 0 of 15 key features.
55 out of 100 match$8/mo
HyNote
AI note taker for meetings, audio & PDF summaries
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
55 out of 100 match$6.66/mo
AudiosTranscribe
AI transcription software for meetings, converting audio and video into structured reports
Covers 0 of 15 key features and has a free plan.
Free plan
55 out of 100 match$7/mo

Key facts

Starts at: —
Free plan: No
Free trial: Yes
Open source: No

What it does

On device transcription using a local speech model with no cloud service
Markdown transcript and summary output that can be copied or saved anywhere on the filesystem
Key moments flagged mid call with k pinned inline in the transcript at the exact timestamp
Live recap view showing the last few minutes of transcript interleaved with flagged key moments
Ask feature chat with recordings on device with clickable timestamps to jump to points in the call
Tracecli command line tool to list summarise and follow live transcripts and to drive trace itself
Shortcuts and spotlight actions to start stop pause flag a moment or grab the last transcript or summary
Meeting aware recording detects when a meeting app picks up the microphone and offers to record automatically with per app memory
Optional calendar connection opt in read only off by default to inherit event titles and get a reminder before meetings
Speaker aware transcription that splits the call by speaker with names remembered across sessions
Export to pdf word web page subtitles or spreadsheet with optional automatic redaction of names emails phone numbers and addresses
Translation of meetings into other languages live or afterwards on device
Support for 99 languages with automatic language detection
Bring your own ai model point trace at any openai compatible server e g lm studio ollama or a hosted api for summaries naming tags and ask
Sessions stored as plain audio and markdown files in finder movable into vaults or versioned in git

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