Fireflies

Overview

Fireflies is an enterprise meeting intelligence platform with API-first architecture. It specializes in automated transcription, speaker identification, and actionable insight extraction for meeting recordings. Fireflies is unique in providing comprehensive GraphQL API and real-time WebSocket capabilities alongside a user-facing application.

Core Transcription Capabilities

Automated Audio Transcription

• Noise reduction for clear transcription
• Speaker identification with participant names
• Context-based corrections for accuracy
• High accuracy transcription processing

Transcript Management

• Fetch past transcripts via API
• Summary retrieval and action items
• Keyword extraction and sentence selection
• Full transcript access for export and analysis
• Delete/archive recordings from servers

Real-time Transcription API

• Realtime API for live transcription events
• WebSocket connections for event streaming
• Low latency data delivery
• Incremental transcription - receive segments progressively

Speaker Identification

Smart Speaker Labels

• Google Meet & Zoom: Automatic participant name identification
• Other platforms: Speaker 1, Speaker 2, etc.
• Participant email addresses included in metadata
• Enable custom insights based on who is speaking

Use Cases

• “What did X say?”
• “When did Y speak?”
• “Track participant engagement”

Advanced Analytics

Meeting Analytics

• Speaking time per participant (percentages)
• Words-per-minute (WPM) by speaker
• Sentiment analysis - emotional tone detection
• Meeting insights on engagement patterns

Custom NLP and Extraction

• Pre-built NLP layer for insight extraction
• Custom topic filtering by category
• Key highlight extraction:
  • Pricing mentions
  • Sentiment statements
  • Next steps and action items
  • Dates and deadlines
  • Important decisions

API Architecture

GraphQL API

Design Philosophy: “Powerful interface designed to provide you with efficient and flexible access to your data”

Capabilities:

• Query structure enables flexible data requests
• Reduces over-fetching of unnecessary data
• Well-suited for dynamic client requirements

REST API

Endpoints:

• Transcription endpoints for upload/processing
• User management and role assignment
• Metadata and contextual data retrieval
• Meeting management and organization

Authentication:

• API key management
• Token-based authentication
• User/team segregation

Real-time WebSocket API

Features:

• Event-based architecture for live events
• Low-latency data streaming
• Structured event format for easy handling
• Incremental transcription updates
• Token authentication for secure WebSocket connections

Use Cases:

• Live captioning applications
• Real-time transcription overlays
• Dashboard updates during meetings
• Custom applications monitoring meetings in progress

Integration Ecosystem

Meeting Platform Integrations

• Zoom - Automatic meeting capture
• Microsoft Teams - Native Teams integration
• Google Meet - Google Workspace support
• Webex - Cisco Webex integration
• Automatic bot joining for recording

CRM and Business Tool Integrations

CRM Systems:

• Salesforce - Activity logging with transcripts
• HubSpot - Contact records with meeting notes
• Pipedrive - Call logs with automatically filled details
• Attio - CRM activity tracking

Project Management:

• Asana - Task and project integration
• Slack - Meeting summaries and notifications

Workflow Automation:

• Zapier - Workflow triggers and actions
• Make (formerly Integromat) - Advanced automation

Data Flow Example (Salesforce)

After meeting:

1. Automatic transcript generation
2. Summary creation
3. Action items extraction
4. Logs to Salesforce contact record with:
   • Call log entry
   • AI-generated meeting notes
   • Transcript link
   • Recording availability
   • Participant information

Metadata and Contextual Data

Transcript Schema

• Participant email addresses
• Speaker arrays with timing
• Calendar event identifiers
• Meeting metadata
• Timestamp information

Recurring Event Identification

• Identifies recurring meetings
• Aggregates insights across series
• Tracks patterns over time

Use Cases

Enterprise Sales

• Automatic call logging to CRM
• Eliminates manual note-taking
• Comprehensive documentation of sales calls
• Insight extraction for coaching and training

Team Collaboration

• Meeting summaries with key highlights
• Action item tracking and assignment
• Sentiment analysis for team dynamics
• Engagement metrics for team performance

Compliance and Documentation

• Complete audit trail of discussions
• Searchable transcripts for regulatory requirements
• Integration with systems of record (CRM, project management)

AI Application Development

• API for building meeting apps on Fireflies platform
• Real-time transcription for custom applications
• Custom NLP for domain-specific extraction
• Webhook integration for custom workflows

Pricing

Details: Freemium model with tiered pricing structure (specific tiers not detailed in available documentation)

Free Plan: Available for individual users/small teams

Paid Plans: Business-tier pricing for enterprise features

Data Control and Privacy

• Cloud-based processing - transcription occurs in cloud
• Integrations handle data flow - CRM systems receive summaries/transcripts
• Transcript retention - Duration not specified in available docs
• Enterprise options - Custom data handling for large organizations

Advantages

✓ Comprehensive API - GraphQL + REST + Real-time WebSocket
✓ Advanced analytics - Speaking time, sentiment, WPM, custom insights
✓ CRM-integrated - Automatic logging to Salesforce, HubSpot, etc.
✓ Speaker identification - Names in Zoom/Google Meet
✓ Real-time capabilities - Live transcription via WebSocket
✓ Enterprise-ready - Meeting platform integrations
✓ Programmatic access - Full API for custom applications

Limitations

• Cloud-only - No self-hosted option
• Vendor lock-in - Data stored in Fireflies systems
• Pricing - Specific pricing structure unclear
• SLA - Enterprise SLA details not specified
• Data retention - Transcript retention policies unclear

Comparison with Other Tools

vs. Otter

• ✅ More advanced analytics
• ✅ Better API (GraphQL + real-time)
• ✅ Superior CRM integration
• ❌ Potentially more complex
• ❌ More expensive (likely)

vs. Jamie

• ✅ Real-time WebSocket API
• ✅ Advanced analytics
• ❌ Less privacy-focused
• ❌ No GDPR strict compliance
• ❌ More cloud-dependent

vs. Granola

• ✅ Advanced analytics and insights
• ✅ Full API and developer features
• ❌ More complex
• ❌ Less automatic meeting detection
• ❌ Meeting-centric (less general)

Ideal User Profile

• Developers building meeting apps needing transcription API
• Enterprise sales teams with CRM integration requirements
• Large organizations needing advanced analytics
• Data teams extracting meeting insights at scale
• API-first developers preferring GraphQL
• Real-time application builders needing WebSocket transcription

Related Tools

• Otter - Simpler alternative with less API
• Jamie - Privacy-focused alternative
• Granola - Simpler, automatic alternative
• Plaud Note - Hardware alternative
• Fireflies API - Detailed API documentation

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Last updated: 2026-01-23