Granola is a desktop AI notepad that captures meeting audio directly from your computer’s system output without joining the call as a bot participant. During the meeting, you type rough notes. After the meeting, Granola’s AI combines your notes with the full transcript to produce structured summaries that reflect what you focused on.
We tested Granola across internal strategy sessions, sensitive one-on-ones, and phone calls via iOS. The workflow difference is foundational. Most meeting AI tools organize around a recording or a transcript. Granola organizes around a document. Your rough notes (“verify launch date,” “client hesitant on pricing,” “follow up on contract terms”) become the steering context for the AI. The final output emphasizes what you flagged, not just what was said loudest or longest. This is the feature that keeps Granola from feeling like a generic summarizer.
Nobody in the meeting knows you’re recording. No bot joins. No consent prompt fires. No “Granola is recording” announcement appears. The audio is captured from your device’s system output, transcribed, and then deleted. Notes are private by default. For consultants, executives, therapists, lawyers, and anyone in meetings where a visible recording bot would fundamentally change what people say, this privacy is the product.
Recipes are custom note templates. Define what you want extracted from each meeting type: a sales call template that pulls objections, pricing discussions, and next steps; a candidate interview template that captures strengths, concerns, and culture fit signals; a sprint review template focused on demos and decisions. The template applies automatically based on meeting type, producing consistent output across weeks of calls.
Spaces turn Granola into a team tool. Create a shared Space for a client, project, or department. Tag meeting notes into the Space, and they become searchable and shareable for everyone with access. Ask Granola searches across your meeting history with natural language queries.
The platform expanded significantly in 2026. Windows support launched alongside Mac. An iOS app handles mobile recording and phone call transcription, closing the biggest gap in the original product. The MCP server connects your meeting data to Claude and Cursor, so you can ask an AI agent “what did the customer say about pricing in our last three calls” and get answers drawn from your Granola notes.
No audio or video recordings are stored on any plan. Granola captures, transcribes, and deletes. If you need a recording archive to replay calls, this isn’t the tool.
