Granola is an AI meeting notes / bot-free notepad by Granola (Granola Recipes Ltd.). This profile pulls together Granola's ratings across the major review sites, its company and funding details, leadership, features, pricing, and the latest news, with every external source cited at the bottom.
About Granola (Granola Recipes Ltd.)
Granola is an AI notepad for people in back-to-back meetings. It runs as a desktop app that captures audio straight from your device, so no bot joins the call, then blends the rough notes you type with an AI summary after the meeting ends.
Founded in March 2023 in London by Chris Pedregal (ex-Google PM who built and sold Socratic and Stack) and Sam Stephenson (a designer turned founder), it raised $192M across four rounds and hit a $1.5B valuation in March 2026.
Granola is one of the fastest-rising brands in the AI meeting-notes category and carries a 4.7/5 rating on G2.
| Category | AI meeting notes / bot-free notepad |
| Company | Granola (Granola Recipes Ltd.) |
| Founded | 2023 |
| Headquarters | London, England, UK (Shoreditch) |
| Industry | Technology, Information & Internet · AI productivity |
| Team size | 11-50 (LinkedIn band, June 2026); 129% reported employee growth |
| Ownership | Private, venture-backed (Series C, $1.5B valuation) |
| Founder / CEO | Chris Pedregal (co-founder & CEO, ex-Google; built and sold Socratic and Stack) and Sam Stephenson (co-founder, design) |
| Specialties | AI meeting notes, bot-free transcription, meeting summaries, note templates, meeting search, AI chat over notes |
| Website | granola.ai |
Find Granola on: Crunchbase · G2 · uk.linkedin.com · producthunt.com
Granola ratings across the web
Aggregated from the major review platforms. Each links to the source.
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What people say about Granola
Our synthesis across 33 G2 reviews at a 4.7/5 average (29 five-star, 3 four-star, 1 three-star), plus independent reviews; a small but consistent sample. No fabricated quotes, this is the consistent pattern across reviews and third-party analyses.
Most praised
- The bot-free model is the most-cited strength: nothing joins the call, so it works on sensitive and external client calls without a visible recording notification
- The hybrid note model (you type rough bullets, AI fills them in) produces summaries that sound like the person who was in the meeting, not a generic AI recap
- Setup is near-zero and Granola auto-detects meetings, so reviewers say it 'gets out of the way and just works'
- Action items, decisions and key points come out clean and structured, and you can chat with the notes to recall details or draft a follow-up
Most cited complaints
- It transcribes device audio but does not record audio or video, so you cannot replay a misheard moment, a gap reviewers flag versus Otter and Fireflies
- Speaker identification gets hit-or-miss once a call has more than a few participants
- Integrations and exports are still maturing; pushing notes into other systems takes more steps than with bot-based competitors
- A few reviewers say support can feel slow or generic on audio-setup and OS-conflict issues, and there is no web version
What we found testing it
What's great
- No bot joins the call; captures audio directly from your device so participants never see a recording notification
- Hybrid note model lets you type rough bullets during the meeting and AI expands them into full notes afterward
- Transcription accuracy of 90-95% on clean audio, competitive with bot-based tools despite the different architecture
Watch-outs
- Mac and Windows desktop only; no browser-based option, no mobile app, no Android support
- Free tier caps at 25 total meetings lifetime, not per month, making it expensive to evaluate seriously
- Speaker identification degrades in calls with more than four participants, a real limitation for large team syncs
Granola funding & ownership
| Round | Amount | Date | Lead investor |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seed | $4.25M | May 2023 | Lightspeed (with Betaworks, Firstminute Capital) |
| Series A | $20M | Oct 2024 | Spark Capital (with AI Grant, Lightspeed, Betaworks, Firstminute Capital) |
| Series B | $43M | May 2025 | NFDG (with Lightspeed, Spark; ~$250M valuation) |
| Series C | $125M | Mar 2026 | Index Ventures + Kleiner Perkins (with Lightspeed, Spark, NFDG; $1.5B valuation) |
Low risk on funding, normal risk for a fast-scaling startup. Granola raised $192M across four rounds in under three years and reached a $1.5B valuation in March 2026, with a $125M Series C led by Index Ventures and Kleiner Perkins.
Repeat founder Chris Pedregal has sold two products to Google, and named enterprise customers include Vanta, Gusto, Asana, Cursor and Mistral AI.
The honest caveats: the team is still small (LinkedIn lists 11-50 employees), the product is desktop-first with newer Windows and iPhone support, and it competes with much larger incumbents (Zoom, Microsoft, Otter, Fireflies) plus the well-funded Fathom.
The valuation jump from $250M to $1.5B in under a year is steep, so price in the usual fast-growth volatility if you standardize a large team on it.
Granola features & integrations
Security & compliance
| Standard | Availability |
|---|---|
| GDPR | Yes (UK/EU company; model-training opt-out available) |
| HIPAA | Not stated |
| SOC 2 Type II | Yes (Type II, 2025 report via trust center) |
| SSO / SAML | Yes (Enterprise tier) |
Integrations: Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Slack, Notion, HubSpot, Attio, Affinity, Zapier, and MCP (Claude and other apps).
Granola leadership
Granola pricing
| Plan | Price | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Basic | $0 | A free taste; AI notes with limited meeting history and no integrations |
| Business | $14/user/mo | Individuals and small teams; unlimited history, advanced AI, integrations, API and MCP |
| Enterprise | $35/user/mo | Large orgs needing SSO, admin controls, org-wide auto-deletion and priority support |
The catch: Granola’s free Basic plan is the evaluation tier, not a forever-free workhorse: it limits meeting history and integrations, which is what pushes active users onto Business at $14/user/month for unlimited history and the advanced AI models.
Granola sells monthly and does not publish an annual discount, so the per-seat number is the per-seat number. SSO, org-wide auto-deletion and admin controls are gated to Enterprise at $35/user/month.
Cost at your team size
Basic is free with limited history. Figures below use the Business tier at $14/user/month (Granola sells monthly, no annual discount stated). Large orgs needing SSO and org-wide controls run Enterprise at $35/user/month, so multiply by roughly 2.5.
| Team size | Annual cost |
|---|---|
| 10 seats | $1,680/yr |
| 50 seats | $8,400/yr |
| 200 seats | $33,600/yr |
Granola alternatives & where it appears
Featured in our guides
Latest Granola news
Auto-pulled from Google News, refreshed on each deploy. Headlines link to the source.
- This Meeting App Feels Like Having My Own Personal Notetaker - The New York TimesThu, 08 Oct 2026
- Google releases a new local-first Granola competitor - TechCrunchThu, 08 Oct 2026
- This AI notetaker won't sell surveillance to your boss - PlatformerThu, 30 Jul 2026
- Latest AI notetaker lawsuit raises fresh HR questions - HR ExecutiveTue, 04 Aug 2026
- ChatGPT for Mac takes on Granola with meeting notes that lead to action - Yahoo TechWed, 07 Oct 2026
- Ragged Edge rebrands AI notepad Granola with a co-founder's handwriting and a deliberately imperfect logo - Creative BoomTue, 14 Jul 2026
Granola FAQs
Is Granola free?
Granola has a free Basic plan with AI meeting notes but limited meeting history and no integrations. The paid Business plan is $14/user/month and unlocks unlimited history, advanced AI models, and integrations.
Granola sells monthly and does not advertise an annual discount.
Does a bot join the call?
No. This is Granola’s headline difference. It runs as a desktop app and captures audio directly from your device, so no recording bot joins the meeting and other participants never see a notification.
That makes it a common pick for first calls with external or enterprise prospects where bot presence is a trust issue.
What platforms does Granola run on?
Is Granola secure and SOC 2 compliant?
Yes. Granola publishes a SOC 2 Type II report (2025) through its trust center at trust.granola.ai, offers a model-training opt-out, and gates SSO plus org-wide controls to the Enterprise tier.
HIPAA is not stated on its public materials, so confirm directly if you handle protected health data.
How much funding has Granola raised?
Sources
Every external figure on this page traces to a public source, last collected on the dates shown.
- G2: Granola reviews — rating 4.7/5, 33 reviews, star distribution, pros/cons themes (read live) (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Capterra: search for Granola — no Granola listing found (Capterra = NA) (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Trustpilot: granola.ai — profile exists but 0 reviews, no usable score (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Granola: pricing — Basic $0, Business $14/user/mo, Enterprise $35/user/mo; per-tier features, SSO, model-training opt-out (read live) (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Granola: Series A blog — $20M Series A led by Spark; founders, Shoreditch HQ (accessed June 20, 2026)
- TechCrunch: Granola raises $125M at $1.5B — Series C $125M, Index Ventures + Kleiner Perkins, total raised $192M, enterprise customers (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Index Ventures: leading Granola's Series C — Series C lead, founders, London HQ (accessed June 20, 2026)
- BusinessWire: Granola raises $43M Series B — Series B $43M, AI workspace launch (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Lightspeed: Granola seed — $4.25M seed led by Lightspeed, May 2023 (accessed June 20, 2026)
- LinkedIn: Granola company page — London HQ, Note-Taking Software, 11-50 employees, 129% employee growth (read live) (accessed June 20, 2026)
- LinkedIn: Chris Pedregal — CEO since Mar 2023; ex-Google; founded Socratic and Stack; CTO hire Nikola Otasevic (read live) (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Granola Trust Center — SOC 2 Type II 2025 report, security policies, PII handling (read live) (accessed June 20, 2026)
- Crunchbase: Granola — rounds, investors, total funding (accessed June 20, 2026)