Is Otter AI free?
Yes, Otter AI has a free plan called Basic. It gives you 300 transcription minutes per month, capped at 30 minutes per conversation, plus 3 lifetime audio/video file imports. It is free forever with no credit card, but longer meetings, more minutes, and unlimited imports require the paid Pro or Business plans.
Why — the first-principles explanation
Otter is free because of the freemium model: the company gives away a capped version to attract a huge number of users, knowing a small fraction will hit the limits and pay to remove them. The free tier is genuinely useful, but every limit is a gentle nudge toward upgrading.
The caps are chosen to fit light personal use but pinch business use. 300 minutes a month is about five hours, fine for a student recording a few lectures, but a professional in back-to-back meetings burns through that in a couple of days. The 30-minute-per-meeting cap means a typical hour-long meeting gets cut off halfway, and the 3 lifetime file imports mean you can test uploading but not rely on it.
This structure lets Otter honestly say 'free forever' while still steering serious users to pay. The free plan is best understood as a full-featured trial with a usage meter, not a crippled demo: transcription, summaries, and the app all work; you simply run out of minutes.
An example that makes it click
It's like a free sample tier at a phone plan. You get real service, calls, texts, data, but only a small monthly bucket. A casual user never notices the limit; a heavy user hits it by mid-month and upgrades. Otter's bucket is 300 minutes: perfect for the occasional lecture or interview, too small for someone in meetings all day.
How to do it
- Go to otter.ai and sign up with an email or Google/Microsoft account, no credit card needed.
- Use the app or web recorder to transcribe live conversations up to 30 minutes each.
- Track your usage: the free plan allows 300 minutes total per month.
- Use your 3 lifetime file imports carefully, since the free plan does not renew them.
- Upgrade to Pro or Business only if you regularly hit the minute or meeting-length caps.
Key facts
- The free Basic plan is free forever and requires no credit card to start.
- It includes 300 transcription minutes per month with a 30-minute cap per conversation.
- Free users get only 3 audio/video file imports total (lifetime), not monthly.
- Core features like live transcription, speaker ID, and summaries are available on the free plan.
- Pro ($16.99/mo or $8.33/mo annual) and Business ($30/mo or $19.99/mo annual) remove most free limits (as of 2026-07).
Live meeting transcription, notes, and summaries.
Affiliate link — we may earn a commission at no cost to you.▶ The 60-second explainer (script)
Is Otter AI free? Yes, there's a genuinely free plan called Basic, and it's free forever with no credit card. It gives you 300 transcription minutes a month, which is about five hours, with a 30-minute cap on any single meeting. You also get three file imports, but that's a lifetime total, not per month, so use them wisely. The good news is the free plan isn't crippled: live transcription, speaker labels, and summaries all work. The catch is the meter. If you only record the occasional lecture or interview, free is plenty. But if you're in meetings all day, you'll blow through 300 minutes fast and the 30-minute cap will cut your hour-long calls in half. That's when Pro or Business, which add way more minutes and longer meetings, start to make sense.
What authoritative sources say
People also ask
Is the free plan a trial that expires?
No. Basic is free forever. You can keep using it indefinitely as long as you stay within the monthly minute and import limits.
Do free minutes roll over?
No. The 300-minute allowance resets each month and unused minutes do not carry over. File imports are a one-time lifetime total of 3.
Do I need a credit card for the free plan?
No. You can sign up with an email or Google/Microsoft login and use Basic without entering any payment details.
What's the biggest limit of the free plan?
For most people it's the 30-minute-per-meeting cap, which cuts off typical hour-long meetings, followed by the 300 total monthly minutes.