Otter’s AI-powered chatbot can answer questions about your meetings

Automated transcription service Otter.ai is launching a new chatbot feature that can “attend” online meetings to help users summarize information and recall details they may have missed, like dates or figures. Otter Chat — described by the company as an “AI meeting genius/participant” — can answer questions and generate content like to-do lists based on what’s being discussed in a call. The feature is rolling out worldwide to all Otter users today, June 21st.

Otter Chat can be used on recorded conversations that have already been transcribed and during live meetings on Zoom, Google Meet, or Microsoft Teams that the platform is actively transcribing. The feature will be available to all Otter users at no additional cost, though free accounts will be limited to five questions per meeting. No limitations will be imposed for premium accounts (which start at $16.99 per month).

Image: Otter.ai

The Otter Chat feature allows users to collaborate with other members of their team, allowing them to discuss points and request information without interrupting the flow of the main conversation. The chatbot can also generate text for action items, summaries, follow-up emails, blog posts, and more based on the information discussed within the meetings it attends. Users can make requests like “please create a draft email that summarizes today’s action items” and the tool will provide a suitable copy, saving time on manually typing it up yourself.

Most of the Otter Chat features build upon some sort of meeting summarization. Otter rolled out an AI-generated meeting summaries feature to its home feed in March last year, so this isn’t a feature that’s necessarily exclusive to its new Otter Chat function. The main perk here is that you can get on-demand answers during the call itself without having to wait until the meeting is finished. Other companies have also recently launched similar “personal assistant” tools that can summarize information pulled from meeting transcripts, such as Microsoft’s Copilot AI Business Chat feature.