# Daisy vs Shadow Daisy records 2,031 monthly visits with +9.4% month-over-month growth and Free pricing. Shadow records 17,796 monthly visits with -4.4% growth and Freemium pricing. | Metric | [Daisy](https://openaitools.app/tool/daisy) | [Shadow](https://openaitools.app/tool/shadow) | | :--- | :--- | :--- | | Website URL | https://www.mydaisy.io | https://www.shadow.do | | Categories | AI Note Taker, AI Meeting Assistant, AI Transcription | AI Meeting Assistant, AI Transcription, AI Note Taker, AI Summarizer | | Pricing Model | Free | Freemium | | Monthly Visits | 2,031 | 17,796 | | MoM Growth Rate | +9.4% | -4.4% | | Primary Market | United States | United States | | Direct Visits | 635 | 7,167 | | Review Score | 4.4 | 4.3 | | Saved Count | 0 | 1 | | Supported Platforms | Website | Website | ## Daisy Daisy is a Mac app for people who want useful meeting notes without handing their conversations to a cloud service. It records meetings, dictation, and voice notes, transcribes everything on-device, and turns speech into searchable notes. Crucially, it captures audio locally, so no recorder bot has to join your call — a detail its users repeatedly say mattered when recording client and interview calls. It offers three modes driven by what you want to capture: meetings (both sides of the conversation, with speaker separation), push-to-talk dictation for everyday to-dos and work tasks, and quick voice notes. Because transcription happens on the machine, the recording and transcript stay on your Mac, which users have verified with firewall checks. The app is local-first and open source, with a public GitHub repository. Daisy is available for macOS now, with the site noting that Windows and iOS builds are in development. It is lightweight and minimalist by design, works alongside AI summary tools, and links into modern workflows such as an MCP server, so it fits teams and individuals who want private, low-friction capture and notes. **Pricing & Plans:** Free to download and use on macOS, with the site describing the app as free and easy to use. Windows and iOS versions are noted as in development. - **Bot-free meeting recording:** Capture both your microphone and anything playing on your Mac, with speaker separation, and get a finished note without a bot joining the call. - **On-device transcription:** Transcription runs on your device, so recordings and transcripts stay on your Mac rather than on someone else's server. - **Push-to-talk dictation:** Use push-to-talk dictation to dictate to-dos, emails, and work tasks that flow straight into your notes. - **Voice notes:** Record and transcribe quick voice notes, then return to the transcript instead of piecing together scattered messages. - **Open source & MCP-ready:** An open-source, local-first Mac app that integrates with workflows and AI tools, including MCP server support and Obsidian-friendly outputs. **Strengths:** Records meetings with no bot joining the call; On-device transcription keeps recordings and transcripts local; Three modes: meetings, push-to-talk dictation, and voice notes; Lightweight, minimalist, local-first design **Limitations:** macOS only for now — Windows and iOS are still in development; On-device transcription quality depends on your Mac's hardware; Open-source setup and MCP integrations may appeal more to technical users; Fewer fully managed cloud features than bot-based meeting tools [Profile (Markdown)](https://openaitools.app/tool/daisy.md) ## Shadow Shadow starts from a complaint many knowledge workers share about meeting assistants: the bot that joins your call, the note-taker that locks your history behind a subscription, and the data that leaves your machine for someone else's servers. Shadow's answer is a native Mac app that operates entirely in the background. It has no bot that joins the meeting, auto-detects when a call begins, records and transcribes it locally, and stops on its own when the call ends. Speaker identification is done in real time, so transcripts arrive labelled with who said what. The output is deliberately portable. Every meeting is written to your Mac as Markdown — transcripts, notes, and Skill results — with every call and every person linked into a knowledge base. You can open the folder as an Obsidian vault, sync it with iCloud Drive or Google Drive, search it with Spotlight, or point any AI agent at it. Shadow emphasises that there is a built-in advantage: because agents read the raw files rather than a connector's filtered view, tools like Claude, Codex, or OpenClaw get the complete context. Between calls, Shadow is more than a note-taker. Press a keyboard shortcut on any screen and it can see what you're looking at, hear what you say, or read selected text, then run an Action Skill to produce an email, a set of notes, or code. Skills are just prompts you can edit or write from scratch, and a webhook can forward results to Zapier, n8n, or Make. The privacy stance is equally concrete: transcription is local, audio does not leave the device, meeting content is never used for model training, and you choose which Skills are allowed to call AI at all. **Pricing & Plans:** Shadow is free to start, and the developer's stated policy is that every meeting is saved to your Mac as Markdown with no history limit on any plan — you keep the files even if you stop paying. For current paid tiers, check the pricing page inside the app. - **Bot-free auto recording:** Shadow detects when a call starts, records automatically, and stops at the end — no bot in the meeting, nothing to remember to press. - **On-device transcription:** Transcription runs on your Mac, with real-time speaker identification so you always know who said what. - **Markdown you own:** Every call is saved as a clean .md file locally, openable as an Obsidian vault, backed up with iCloud or Drive, or searchable by Spotlight. - **Meeting and Action Skills:** Run prompts on a completed call (notes, BANT, follow-ups, summaries) plus shortcut-driven actions on your screen between meetings. - **Webhooks and automation:** A webhook pushes transcripts and Skill results into Zapier, n8n, or Make so meetings feed your existing workflows. **Strengths:** No bot joins your call, so meetings stay natural; Local, on-device transcription with no history limits; Meetings stored as portable Markdown that works with Obsidian and AI agents; Flexible Skills you can edit or write from scratch **Limitations:** Mac-only — there is no Windows or web app; Local-first storage means you manage your own folder, sync, and backups; By design it records without a bot, so you are responsible for getting consent from other participants; Skill output quality still depends on prompt craft, though Skills ship with sensible defaults [Profile (Markdown)](https://openaitools.app/tool/shadow.md) ## Frequently Asked Questions ### How do Daisy and Shadow compare in monthly traffic? Daisy has 2,031 monthly visits, while Shadow has 17,796. Traffic estimates describe audience size, not product quality. ### How do their growth rates compare? Daisy has a month-over-month growth rate of +9.4%; Shadow has -4.4%. ### How does pricing compare? Daisy: Free. Free to download and use on macOS, with the site describing the app as free and easy to use. Windows and iOS versions are noted as in development. Shadow: Freemium. Shadow is free to start, and the developer's stated policy is that every meeting is saved to your Mac as Markdown with no history limit on any plan — you keep the files even if you stop paying. For current paid tiers, check the pricing page inside the app. ## Alternatives | # | Tool Name | Monthly Visits | MoM Growth Rate | Pricing Model | Summary | Profile (Markdown) | | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- | | 1 | [Otter AI](https://openaitools.app/tool/otter-ai) | 7,360,981 | +9.6% | Freemium | AI meeting agent that transcribes, summarises, and turns every conversation into searchable knowledge | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/otter-ai.md) | | 2 | [Fathom](https://openaitools.app/tool/fathom-2-0) | 5,620,385 | +0.2% | Freemium, Free Trial | AI notetaker that records, transcribes and summarizes meetings — bot-free | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/fathom-2-0.md) | | 3 | [Fireflies.ai](https://openaitools.app/tool/fireflies-ai) | 4,411,502 | +3% | Freemium | AI teammate that records, transcribes and summarizes every meeting | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/fireflies-ai.md) | | 4 | [Noota](https://openaitools.app/tool/noota) | 283,526 | +3.3% | Freemium, Paid, Contact for Pricing | Bot-free AI meeting assistant hosted in Europe | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/noota.md) | | 5 | [Circleback](https://openaitools.app/tool/circleback) | 272,906 | +12.5% | Free Trial | AI notetaker and company brain that turns every meeting into searchable knowledge | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/circleback.md) | | 6 | [Fellow](https://openaitools.app/tool/fellow) | 188,722 | -5% | Contact for Pricing | The secure AI meeting notetaker built for teams that cannot get privacy wrong | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/fellow.md) | | 7 | [Bubbles](https://openaitools.app/tool/bubbles) | 148,424 | +2% | Freemium, Free Trial | Always-on AI meeting notetaker with a self-erasing screen replay | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/bubbles.md) | | 8 | [Meeting.ai](https://openaitools.app/tool/meeting-ai) | 135,717 | +14.1% | Freemium, Free Trial | AI note taker that turns meetings into minutes, decks and documents | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/meeting-ai.md) | | 9 | [Spinach AI](https://openaitools.app/tool/spinach-ai) | 118,321 | +23.9% | Freemium | Put your meetings on autopilot and never miss an action item again. | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/spinach-ai.md) | | 10 | [Sembly AI](https://openaitools.app/tool/sembly-ai) | 111,734 | +3.8% | Freemium | AI meeting agent that turns conversations into client-ready deliverables | [.md](https://openaitools.app/tool/sembly-ai.md) | --- Source: https://openaitools.app/compare/daisy-vs-shadow More Markdown: [Categories](https://openaitools.app/categories.md) · [Traffic rankings](https://openaitools.app/rankings.md) · [llms.txt](https://openaitools.app/llms.txt)