An Honest Granola Review 2026 | An Exciting AI Note-Taker

Granola is an exciting AI note-taking app. But is it among the best AI note-taking apps in 2026?

Stay here, because in this Granola review, I will share my honest experience with this app when I used it for several online meetings.

In addition, I will show you all its key features, pricing model, and pros & cons, so you can get an idea of whether Granola is worth it for you.

Let’s dive in!

What is Granola?

Granola is a lightweight and simple bot-less AI note-taker for online meetings. This is one of its main strengths, but also a weakness, and later I will tell you exactly why I come to this conclusion.

It works on all the video conferencing platforms, including Google Meet, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams. To utilize Granola, you need to download its desktop app (Windows or Mac).

Ultimately, it was designed for people with back-to-back meetings, helping them stay engaged and focus on the discussion rather than taking notes.

Key features

Now let’s take a closer look at the key features I tried during my Granola review!

Bot-free transcription

The reason why I loved Granola is that this AI note-taking app does not use meeting bots to transcribe calls. Essentially, it means that it only listens to your device’s audio, and no bots join your meeting.

The meeting transcript is very simple, as you can see. Granola transcribes meetings in real time. That said, you only need to hit the button to see the live transcript.

Once someone else starts to talk, speaker recognition is turned on, and it will organize transcripts accordingly. However, there is no advanced speaker identification, and the real-time transcription will identify speakers as Speaker A, Speaker B, and so on.

Nonetheless, during my Granola review, I discovered that if you are looking for call recordings, you are not gonna find them, as Grain can only transcribe and summarize your meetings.

AI notes

Granola’s AI-generated notes work a bit differently compared to other meeting tools. Besides analyzing the transcript, it converts your own notes from the meeting into an AI-generated summary.

If you take a closer look at the picture, you will see text in black. Now, that’s my own notes, while all the other bullet points are written by Granola.

To convert your own notes into AI-generated notes, you only need to click on the “Enhance notes” option, and Granola will take care of the rest.

Personally, I loved this solution, and I was impressed by how it transforms my notes into AI-powered meeting notes. Nevertheless, it was a bit too basic for me compared to some other tools like Fellow or MeetGeek, where I get more advanced meeting notes.

Ask Granola

The Ask Granola feature works like an AI chatbot for your meetings. During my Granola review, I asked questions, asked to write follow-ups, or identify action items.

Ask Granola provided me with relevant outputs, and it was pretty fast. It was great to see that Granola included this feature in the Free plan.

Ultimately, it is a helpful feature to quickly access the key points about your meetings or perform some meeting-related tasks faster.

Templates

With Granola, you can choose from numerous meeting templates. Based on the template you choose, it will organize your meeting notes accordingly.

That said, it offers meeting templates for 1:1 meetings, customer calls, and more. An additional plus for me is that you can add and remove sections when customizing or creating a new meeting template.

This way, you can fully personalize the templates for your meetings. It is definitely a useful feature for many users!

Team features

Finally, Granola has some team features for small businesses. It is useful that you can share the meeting notes with a few clicks through email, Slack, a link, or by copying the text.

Also, you can create shared folders with your teams, so you can centralize your meeting summaries in one place and organize them into different folders, like sales calls or team meetings.

Granola integrations

In the course of my Granola review, I discovered that it is excellent in terms of integrations, as you can connect it with some of the most popular apps like Google Workspace, HubSpot, Slack, and Zapier.

Also, I recommend adding Granola to your Google Calendar & your Google Workspace account for a better user experience.

Granola user interface

In short, Granola has a simple and intuitive user interface. On the left side, you will access your notes, folders, account information, and more.

Probably, one of the most straightforward interfaces I saw in the past three years was when testing AI note-taking apps.

Granola pricing

Granola offers a Basic plan (i.e., Free plan) and two paid plans.

Let me break them down for you!

Basic plan

Granola provides a free Basic plan with features like AI meeting notes, Ask Granola, shared folders, customized note templates, and multi-language support. However, your meeting notes will stay viewable for a limited time.

The free tier is ideal for those who want to give Granola a try but are not sure if it is for them.

Business plan

The Business plan is $14 per user per month, and includes everything in the Basic plan. Additionally, you will get unlimited meeting history and notes, consolidated billing, access to the advanced AI models, and you can connect Granola with Slack, Hubspot, Notion, Zapier, Attio, and Affinity.

Enterprise plan

Finally, Granola offers an Enterprise plan for larger companies for $35 per user per month. It covers enterprise-grade security, SSO, priority support, usage analytics, and more. So, this plan is for businesses with higher compliance and security requirements.

Overall, Granola’s pricing is okay. I would not call it overpriced, but it is not as cheap, given the features it offers for this price.

Granola’s security

During my Granola review, I took a deep dive into its security and privacy policy. Also, I did some research on the web to see if there are any red flags about this AI note-taking app.

Granola is SOC 2 and GDPR compliant, and it does not allow third parties to use your data to train their AI models. So, all looks good on paper.

However, I found some past reports of Granola allowing anyone to download other users’ transcripts without authentication. It was around May, but since then, I have not found any red flags.

Personally, I wouldn’t worry about this too much, as it’s likely not going to happen again, but it’s good to know there were some security holes on Granola’s shield lately.

My experience with Granola

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r86jI_QsntE

During my Granola review, I had some mixed feelings. Let me break this down.

From the positive side, Granola provided accurate transcriptions. It impressed me with the meeting notes and the way it converts my own notes into AI-generated summaries. The desktop app is intuitive and straightforward, and ultimately, this meeting tool has a short learning curve.

On the other hand, Granola was simply too basic for me. What hurts the most for me is that Granola cannot record video, which is crucial for many users, including me.

Granola’s pricing is okay, but I could not call it budget-friendly. Don’t get me wrong, it provides a good value for this money, but still, there might be some better options out there for the same price.

To summarize, I enjoyed using Granola, and it is a reliable AI note-taker. However, it is that typical app you have to try yourself, as its final judgement would really depend on your preferences. Fortunately, it has an extensive free tier, so you can test it without paying a penny.

Pros and cons I found during my Granola review

Now, let’s break down Granola’s strengths and weaknesses.

Pros of Granola

Cons of Granola

Granola alternatives

If you are still unsure whether Granola is the right AI note-taker for you, check out these alternatives:

• Fellow: A fantastic Otter AI alternative for professionals and teams. This is the one I use for online meetings.
• Fireflies AI: A popular and budget-friendly AI meeting assistant for individuals and teams.
• Notta: A unique AI note-taker that allows multi-language transcription, enabling people to speak two different languages during online meetings.
• MeetGeek: A versatile AI note-taking app with the best AI meeting summaries.
• Tl;dv: A great option for individuals with a feature-rich free plan.
• Laxis: One of the best options for sales teams.
• Fathom: An accurate AI note-taker with an extensive free plan.
• Radiant: It is a 100% free AI bot-less note-taker for Mac users for in-person and online meetings.
• Otter AI: One of the most popular AI note-takers for Google Meet, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams.

Wrap up: Granola review

After my Granola review, I found out that it is a reliable and simple AI note-taking app for your Google Meet, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams calls.

For some of you, this simplicity will be an advantage, as you can quickly learn it, and you don’t need advanced tools. However, users like me who have already tried numerous AI note-takers find it too basic, and I would not swap my current AI note-taker (Fellow) to Granola.

Related articles:

• Fireflies AI vs Otter AI: A REAL Comparison With No Fluff (2025)
• Otter AI vs Fellow: My pick after +2 years testing (2025)
• Best 5 Otter AI Alternatives | 20+ Personally Tested Apps (2025)
• 5 Best Bot-Free AI Note-Takers In 2026 (NOT What You’d Think)

Hope I was able to help you find the best AI note-taker for you. As always, I will update this Granola review over time so you guys have up-to-date information about this AI note-taking app.

Why you can trust our reviews

At thebusinessdive.com, our team tests, reviews, and compares hundreds of productivity apps every year — from project management tools to note-taking apps. We dive deep into real-world use cases to help you find the right tools that actually improve your workflow, not just add noise.

Our mission? No fluff, no shortcuts—just honest, hands-on insights from productivity pros.

Have a question or suggestion? I’d love to hear from you. Feel free to reach out anytime at aronkantor@thebusinessdive.com.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Granola AI safe?

Granola is SOC 2 and GDPR compliant, and does not allow AI model training on your data. Nevertheless, I found some reports from the past when Granola allowed anyone to download other users’ transcripts without authentication.

Does Granola AI work in person?

If you turn on your desktop app, then yes, you can utilize Granola AI for in-person meetings.

Is Granola AI free?

Granola has a free tier with extensive features, but it’s not unlimited. It is sufficient to test Granola for yourself before purchasing it. With the paid plans, you will access unlimited meetings, integrations, and more.

Is Granola better than Otter?

It is a tough question. While Otter AI offers a more robust feature set, I preferred using Granola. That being said, if you need a simple solution without a bot, Granola is a better choice for me. Alternatively, if you need something more robust, Otter AI could be the right choice.

Disclosure: I only recommend products I would use myself, and all opinions expressed here are our own. This post may contain affiliate links that, at no additional cost to you, may earn a small commission. Read the full privacy policy here.