📊 Monthly Allowance Breakdown
🎯 What You Get Each Month
📝 Core Allowances:
- 300 transcription minutes: Primary monthly allowance
- 30-minute session limit: Maximum single recording length
- 3 lifetime imports: File upload capability (not monthly)
- Basic AI summaries: Up to 600 words per meeting
- Speaker identification: Generic 'Speaker 1, 2' labels
📈 Usage Calculations:
- Daily average: 10 minutes per day
- Weekly budget: 75 minutes per week
- Workday allocation: 13.6 minutes per workday (22 days)
- Maximum sessions: 10 full 30-minute recordings
- Short meeting capacity: 30 meetings at 10 minutes each
⏰ Reset Cycle Details
Unlike many services that reset on the first of each month, Otter.ai uses an anniversary-based reset system tied to your account creation date.
Account Created
January 15th
Example creation date
Reset Date
15th of each month
Anniversary-based reset
Reset Time
12:00 AM PST
Pacific Standard Time
📱 Usage Tracking and Monitoring
📊 How to Check Your Usage
🖥️ Desktop App:
- Settings → Plan: View current usage and limits
- Home dashboard: Quick usage overview widget
- Recording history: Individual session minute counts
- Usage alerts: Notifications at 80% and 95% capacity
- Export reports: Download usage history CSV
📱 Mobile App:
- Profile tab: Tap usage meter for details
- Before recording: Remaining minutes displayed
- After recording: Updated usage immediately shown
- Push notifications: Low balance alerts
- Sync across devices: Real-time usage updates
⚠️ Usage Monitoring Best Practices
📋 Weekly Tracking Template:
Week 1: ___/75 minutes used
Week 2: ___/75 minutes used
Week 3: ___/75 minutes used
Week 4: ___/75 minutes used
Total Used: ___/300 minutes
Reset Date: ____________
🎯 Optimization Strategies:
- • Check usage every Monday morning
- • Set calendar reminders before reset date
- • Plan high-priority recordings for early month
- • Save buffer minutes for unexpected important meetings
- • Use manual notes when approaching monthly limit
⚠️ Key Limitations and Restrictions
🚫 Hard Limits
⏱️ Session Restrictions:
- 30-minute maximum: Recording stops automatically
- No session extension: Must start new recording
- No pause/resume: Each session counts against limit
- Live recording only: No post-processing of long files
- Real-time constraint: Cannot speed up to save minutes
📁 Import Limitations:
- 3 lifetime limit: Cannot be reset or increased
- File size limit: 100MB maximum per file
- Format restrictions: MP3, WAV, M4A, MP4 only
- No batch processing: One file at a time
- No import sharing: Cannot transfer between accounts
📉 Feature Restrictions
🔒 Missing Premium Features:
- No integrations: Zoom, Teams, Slack connections unavailable
- Limited search: Basic keyword search only
- No custom vocabulary: Industry-specific terms not recognized
- Generic speaker labels: Cannot customize speaker names
- Basic summaries: 600-word limit on AI summaries
📊 Analytics Limitations:
- No talk time analysis: Speaker duration metrics unavailable
- No sentiment analysis: Emotional tone detection missing
- Basic export options: Limited format choices
- No advanced insights: Keyword frequency analysis unavailable
- Single device sync: No collaborative features
🎯 Maximizing Your 300 Minutes
📅 Strategic Planning
🎯 Meeting Prioritization:
- High priority (200 min): Client calls, project kickoffs
- Medium priority (75 min): Team meetings, 1:1s
- Low priority (25 min): Emergency buffer
- Skip recording: Standups, social meetings
- Alternative methods: Manual notes, voice memos
⏰ Timing Strategies:
- Start/stop recording: Capture only key segments
- Skip small talk: Begin recording after introductions
- End before Q&A: Stop before casual discussion
- Multiple sessions: Break long meetings into parts
- Planning buffer: Reserve 30 minutes for unexpected meetings
🤝 Team Collaboration
👥 Account Sharing Strategies:
Each team member needs their own Otter account. Sharing login credentials violates terms of service.
Legitimate Team Approaches:
- • Rotate recording responsibility among team members
- • Assign specific meeting types to different team members
- • Share exported transcripts via email or shared folders
- • Use calendar assignments for recording duties
- • Create team documentation from individual recordings
🆚 Free Plan Alternatives
| Platform | Monthly Minutes | Session Limit | File Imports | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Otter.ai | 300 | 30 min | 3 lifetime | English meetings |
| Tldv | 1,000 | Unlimited | 20/month | Heavy users |
| Fireflies | 800 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Team collaboration |
| Notta | 120 | 5 min | 3/month | Multilingual |
| Rev.ai | 300 | Unlimited | API only | Developers |
📊 Recommendation Matrix:
💚 Stick with Otter If:
- • English-only meetings
- • 300 minutes is sufficient
- • Sessions under 30 minutes
- • Prefer established platform
🔄 Consider Alternatives If:
- • Need more than 300 minutes
- • Longer session recordings
- • Team collaboration required
- • Frequent file imports needed
💰 Upgrade If:
- • Consistently hitting limits
- • Need integrations
- • Advanced features required
- • Business use case
💰 When to Consider Upgrading
📈 Otter Pro Benefits ($10/month)
- 1,200 monthly minutes: 4x the free allowance
- 90-minute sessions: 3x longer recordings
- 10 imports per month: Regular file processing
- Advanced AI summaries: Enhanced meeting insights
- Custom vocabulary: Industry-specific terms
- Zoom integration: Automatic meeting recording
- Export options: Multiple format choices
📊 ROI Calculation
Cost per Minute:
$10 ÷ 1,200 minutes = $0.0083 per minute
Break-even Analysis:
If transcription saves you 10 minutes of note-taking per hour recorded, Pro pays for itself at 100 minutes monthly usage.
Value Threshold:
Upgrade makes sense if you consistently use 250+ minutes monthly or need sessions longer than 30 minutes.