Free Fireflies Alternative
No Bot in Your Call. You Send the Recording.
Fireflies and Otter auto-join your calls with a notetaker bot and need calendar access. @vustScribeBot works the other way: nothing joins your meeting, nothing touches your calendar. You record it yourself, send the file, and get a transcript, summary and action items back — in Telegram, pay-per-use. If you specifically want a bot that auto-joins Zoom or Meet, that's Fireflies, not this.
VUST Scribe vs Fireflies — the honest shape
| Tool | Capture method | Joins your call | Account | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| VUST (@vustScribeBot) | Send the recording | No — nothing joins | No — just Telegram | Record-and-send notes + action items |
| Fireflies | Auto-joins Zoom / Meet / Teams | Yes | Yes | Live capture, CRM sync, search |
VUST Scribe: audio-in only, ≤20 min / 20 MB, free ≤5 min (3/day); for 5-20 minutes, price stated up front, debit when the file is sent, automatic refund on processing or delivery failure. No Fireflies pricing is quoted here — check their site for current plans.
The real difference
Auto-join vs record-and-send — pick the one that fits you
Fireflies and Otter are meeting-intelligence suites: they connect to your calendar and drop a bot into your live calls to record them. That's genuinely useful for back-to-back recurring meetings — and if that's what you need, use them, this isn't it. VUST is the opposite trade-off: no bot in the room, no calendar connection, no account. You send a recording you already have and get transcript, summary and action items back, inside Telegram, paying only for what you send. Lighter, more private, and free for short clips — but no live-call capture.
See the difference
The auto-join model side by side with the record-and-send model, then a real recording turned into notes.
Who wants an alternative to a call-joining bot
- Privacy-minded meeters
- Don't want a visible notetaker bot changing how the conversation goes.
- Nothing joins the call — you record it yourself and send the file afterwards.
- Calendar-shy users
- Won't grant a tool calendar access just for the occasional meeting.
- No calendar connection and no account — your Telegram identity is the login.
- Occasional, not subscription
- Have a few meetings a month, not a wall of recurring calls.
- Pay per recording instead of taking a monthly plan; the bot shows the exact price first, and clips under 5 minutes are free.
- In-person and ad-hoc
- Record a room or a phone call where no meeting-bot could join anyway.
- Any audio file works — send it, get transcript, summary and action items.
Record-then-send, not auto-join
- 01
You record the meeting
Capture it yourself or export the audio your call tool saved. No bot joins the call and no calendar is connected.
- 02
Send the file to Telegram
Forward the recording to @vustScribeBot — a voice message, audio file or video note. No account to create.
- 03
Get notes and action items
Transcript, a summary of decisions, and the action items — in the meeting's own language. Pay only for what you send.
A Fireflies alternative with no bot in your call
Send @vustScribeBot a recording and get transcript, summary and action items — no calendar, no account.
The honest trade-off vs Fireflies
No auto-join — on purpose
Fireflies and Otter drop a bot into your live calls via calendar access. VUST does not. If a bot that auto-joins Zoom or Meet is what you need, that's Fireflies, not this.
Lighter and more private
No bot in the room, no calendar, no account, Telegram-native. The wedge is the workflow difference: record-and-send instead of a live participant bot.
Core notes, not a suite
You get transcript, summary and action items — not a live-call dashboard, CRM integrations or a team workspace. Fewer moving parts by design.
Free and refunded
Free ≤5min (3/day); for 5-20min files, the bot shows the exact price before confirmation and refunds automatically if processing fails. Up to 20min / 20MB per file.
Frequently asked questions
Does this auto-join my Zoom or Google Meet calls like Fireflies does?
No — and this is the honest, load-bearing difference. Fireflies and Otter connect to your calendar and send a bot to sit in the call live. @vustScribeBot does none of that: no calendar access, no participant bot, nothing in the room. It works record-then-send — you send it the recording afterwards. If a bot that auto-joins your live calls is genuinely what you need, that's Fireflies or Otter, not this.
So what is the actual advantage of the VUST approach?
For a lot of people the auto-join bot is the problem, not the feature — a visible notetaker changes how a conversation goes, and calendar access plus an account is more than they want for the occasional meeting. VUST's wedge is exactly that: no bot in your call, no calendar connection, no separate account, and it lives inside Telegram you already use. You pay per recording instead of holding a subscription.
Is it really free?
Recordings of 5 minutes or less are free, up to 3 per day. Longer recordings, from 5 to 20 minutes, are pay-per-use with the exact price shown in Telegram before payment: the exact price is stated up front, the debit happens when you send the file, and processing or delivery failure triggers an automatic refund. There's no account to create and no card: your Telegram identity is the login.
What do I actually get back, compared to Fireflies output?
A full transcript, a short summary of the decisions and key points, and a list of action items — in the language the meeting was held in. It's the recording-to-notes core, without the live-call dashboard, CRM integrations and team workspace a full meeting-intelligence suite layers on top.
Can I send it a text transcript instead of audio?
No — the input is the audio recording itself: a voice message, an audio file or a video note. There's no paste-your-transcript mode. Send the recording and it produces the transcript and notes for you.
What are the hard limits I should know before switching?
One recording at a time, up to 20 minutes and 20MB per file — anything longer is rejected upfront with no charge, so trim or split first. There's no live-call capture, no calendar sync, and no persistent team workspace. If those are dealbreakers, a full suite like Fireflies fits better; if they're non-issues, this is the lighter, cheaper, more private path.
Ready when you are
No bot in your call. Just send the recording.
Record-then-send instead of auto-join — no calendar access, no account, pay-per-use in Telegram. Not a fit if you need a live-call bot.