tl;dv Review 2026: A Generous Free Meeting Recorder, After a Security Scare
tl;dv records Google Meet, Zoom and Teams calls with a bot or, through its desktop app, without one; it transcribes in 30+ languages, writes AI notes, answers questions across meetings and pushes notes into your CRM. The free plan keeps unlimited recordings and transcripts, with AI features capped and videos deleted after 3 months. Pro costs $29 per seat a month or $18 billed yearly; Business $39 or $29. In August 2026 a security researcher published a disclosure that meeting data was exposed; tl;dv says only metadata was affected and both issues are fixed. This review checks tl;dv's pricing page, help center, terms and both sides of that incident as of Oct 5, 2026.
| Made by | tldx Solutions GmbH, Aachen, Germany |
| Works with | Google Meet, Zoom, Teams; desktop app for any platform |
| Free plan | Unlimited recordings, capped AI, 3-month storage |
| Cheapest paid | $29/seat/mo Pro, or $18 billed yearly |
| Chrome extension | 4.6 from 597 ratings |
One of the most generous free meeting recorders, with strong sales features on paid plans. Read the security section before you put sensitive calls on it.
"Start on the free plan: unlimited recordings and transcripts cost nothing, and you will know within a week whether the AI notes fit how you work. Before rolling it out company-wide, read both the researcher's disclosure and tl;dv's response, and check your sharing settings."
Here is how I read it. tl;dv's free plan is unusually generous on recording: unlimited meetings and transcripts in 30+ languages, with AI notes for your first 10 meetings and only the first 10 minutes after that. Pro removes the AI caps and adds CRM integrations, MCP and an API; Business adds multi-meeting insights, sales playbooks and a premium transcription model. Recording without a bot through the desktop app is now an option. The concerns are trust and support: an independent researcher said in August 2026 that meeting metadata was readable by any logged-in user for months, tl;dv says the exposure was limited and fixed, and recent Trustpilot reviews describe support delays and lock-outs after email or domain changes. This is an editorial review based on tl;dv's official pricing page, help center and terms (as of Oct 5, 2026) and public user reviews; it is not a hands-on test.
Record, transcribe, summarize, then push the notes where your team works.
tl;dv connects to your calendar and, with auto-recording on, sends a bot named "tl;dv" into scheduled Google Meet, Zoom and Teams calls. Each meeting gets a video, a speaker-labelled transcript and AI notes built from templates, with timestamps that jump to the moment in the recording. Ask tl;dv AI answers questions about one meeting or many, and integrations sync notes to CRMs and 5,000+ tools.
Map built from tl;dv's pricing page and help center, Oct 5, 2026.
A European, freemium note taker leaning hard into sales teams.
400,000 users on the Google Meet extension, Oct 5, 2026.
Small sample; 8 reviews in the last 12 months.
App Store (US) has no ratings yet; Google Play lists 10K+ downloads.
tl;dv's pages use several different figures.
| Option | Built around | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| tl;dv | Free recording plus sales AI on paid plans | AI capped on Free; trust questions in 2026 |
| Bot-based US note takers | Transcripts, search, integrations | Different data residency |
| Conversation intelligence suites | Deep sales coaching | Much higher price |
| Built-in Meet, Zoom or Teams notes | Already in your meeting app | Tied to one platform |
Extension users love the free notes; paying customers complain about support.
A free-plan user said the summaries are well done, each point time-stamped to the video, with the full transcript alongside (Sep 9). Another called it one of the best note takers they had tried and praised it for following EU rules (Sep 14). A small-business owner said it works perfectly for them (Sep 17).
A customer paying $432 a year for two seats said they were locked out of all recordings for nearly two weeks after asking to change their login email (Jun 3). Another said support ignored a simple email change for over a month (Jun 8). A third said billing continued after a cancellation request following a domain migration (Mar 30).
One commenter on the researcher's disclosure noted tl;dv had shipped a fix a few days earlier but questioned its framing of the exposed data as public (Aug 10). Another quoted the researcher's complaint that six months of emails to the CTO got no response (Aug 10). A third said an internal employee app named in the post was still reachable at the time (Aug 4).
A real free plan, two per-seat paid plans, and Enterprise.
Free
No credit card.
- Unlimited recordings and transcripts, 30+ languages
- AI notes on 10 meetings, then first 10 minutes only
- Recordings deleted after 3 months
Pro
$18/seat/mo billed annually.
- Unlimited AI notes and single-meeting Ask AI
- CRM, 5,000+ integrations, MCP, API, webhooks
- Storage kept while you subscribe
Business
$29/seat/mo billed annually.
- Unlimited multi-meeting AI insights
- Scheduled AI reports, playbooks, objection handling
- Team-wide integrations and automations
Enterprise
Contact sales.
- SCIM, custom SSO (SAML, OIDC)
- Privately hosted AI, activity logs
- Dedicated success manager
Swipe the table sideways to see every column.
| Limit | Free | Pro | Business | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Web recordings per week | 40 | 80 | 120 | 500 |
| Recording length | 3 h | 3 h | 3 h | 3 h |
| Simultaneous meetings | None | 2 | 3 | Custom |
| AI meeting notes | 10 meetings | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Multi-meeting Ask AI | 5 queries | 5 queries | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Uploads | 5 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Data retention | 3 months | Custom | Custom | Custom |
| Check you can do | Result (our calculation) |
|---|---|
| Pro, yearly vs monthly | $216 vs $348 a year per seat: about 38% off |
| Business, yearly vs monthly | $348 vs $468 a year per seat: about 26% off |
| Team of 5 on Business, yearly | $1,740 a year |
| Free users in a paid workspace | Not charged; only paid members are seats |
| Non-profits and NGOs | Discounts on request via support chat |
Decide by how much AI you need and how sensitive your calls are.
Free; download anything you want to keep before 3 months.
Pro, yearly once you are sure.
Business for playbooks, reports and multi-meeting AI.
Enterprise.
Use the desktop app's bot-free mode (audio only).
Read the security section and keep public sharing off.
Notes that link to the video, and questions answered across meetings.
After each call tl;dv writes notes from a template, such as topic summaries or a sales framework, with timestamps that jump to that moment in the recording. Action items can be assigned, and a follow-up email can be drafted. Ask tl;dv AI answers questions about a single meeting or, on Business and above, across many meetings, using suggested prompts like customer pain points or a performance report. Transcription covers 30+ languages; tl;dv's help center says a premium Whisper-based model with auto language detection, mixed languages and custom dictionaries is available on Business and Enterprise, while the pricing page lists premium transcription quality from Pro.
tl;dv's short product overview for sales teams. Published May 22, 2024, so some screens are older than the current app.
From the official tl;dv YouTube channel (youtube.com/@tldv.io_yt). Vendor video, so it shows the best case.
- Notes are tied to timestamps in the video.
- Unlimited recordings even on Free.
- Templates for sales frameworks and custom notes.
- Free AI notes cover only the first 10 minutes after 10 meetings.
- The premium transcription model's plan differs between pages.
- Free recordings move to archive after 3 days and take up to 90 minutes to unarchive.
Calendar, bot or desktop app, notes, sync.
On the Free plan, tl;dv says paid users get priority when its servers are under heavy load, and in rare cases a free user's meeting may not be recorded.
Scheduled AI reports for managers, and your meetings inside Claude or ChatGPT.
Business plans can schedule AI reports that include up to 25 meetings at a time and email the result weekly or on a set day. Pro and above connect to CRMs, Zapier and other tools, and offer an API, webhooks and an MCP server. tl;dv's MCP article says it works with paid Claude plans (Pro, Max, Team or Enterprise) and with ChatGPT Plus, Team or Enterprise connectors, and needs tl;dv Pro or higher.
A short from tl;dv showing its MCP server used inside Claude. Published Sep 9, 2026.
From the official tl;dv YouTube channel. Vendor video. New to MCP? See the JAVIS Claude MCP and Connectors guide.
A bot by default, a bot-free desktop app, and built-in consent collection.
| Option | What tl;dv says |
|---|---|
| Bot | Joins scheduled Meet, Zoom and Teams calls as an attendee when auto-recording is on; records video |
| Desktop app, bot-free | Records your microphone and system audio on any platform; no video, screen share or chat; other sounds on your computer are captured too |
| Mobile app | Records in-person meetings and uploads them to your library |
| Uploads | Transcribe existing files; 5 on Free |
| Consent Collection | Replaces the calendar link with a consent page; if a participant declines, tl;dv will not record and cannot be restarted for that meeting |
Simple prices, strict refunds, and a 3-month clock on free recordings.
| Rule | What tl;dv says |
|---|---|
| Refunds | Terms: "Unless otherwise agreed, all fees paid to tldx are non-refundable." |
| Cancelling | Account and Billing, Manage subscription, then "Cancel plan" in Stripe |
| Free recordings | Stored 3 months; deletion batches on the 1st of each month with an email 4 weeks before; download only in that window |
| Pro storage | Kept "for as long as you stay with us" |
| Free limits | Lifetime of the account, not monthly |
| Law and venue | German law; courts of Aachen, Germany |
EU hosting and SOC 2 on paper, and a security incident you should read both sides of.
| Topic | What tl;dv says |
|---|---|
| Hosting | Data centers in Europe (Google Cloud, AWS, Hetzner; storage on Wasabi); EU or US hosting choice for AI |
| Certifications | SOC 2 Type II and GDPR compliant, per its security page |
| Encryption | AES-256 at rest; SSL/HTTPS in transit |
| AI training | "No customer data is used to train the AI"; partners with Anthropic |
| Public sharing | Opt-in and off by default |
| Company | tldx Solutions GmbH, Aachen, Germany |
| Question | Researcher says | tl;dv says |
|---|---|---|
| What was exposed? | Metadata for 181,874 meetings from 84,312 users, readable by any logged-in user; conference IDs could be used to join live calls | Metadata only: meeting IDs, conference IDs, participant emails and domains; no recordings, transcripts, notes or billing data |
| Content? | Over 1,000 of 27,334 checked meetings were public | Only meetings users had chosen to make public were reachable |
| Timeline | Reported January 28, 2026; still open in July | Two distinct vectors; the first fixed and validated months earlier, the second closed within 24 hours |
| Follow-up | No response from the CTO for six months | CTO took responsibility for the communication gap; removing Firebase from the stack |
Best for sales and customer teams on a budget, and free users who mostly need recordings.
| Situation | Why tl;dv fits or not | Likely plan |
|---|---|---|
| Freelancer or student recording calls | Unlimited recordings and transcripts for free | Free |
| Account executive | AI notes, CRM sync, follow-up drafts | Pro |
| Sales or CS manager | Playbooks, scheduled reports, multi-meeting AI | Business |
| EU company wanting EU hosting | German company, EU data centers | Business or Enterprise |
| Highly confidential calls | Weigh the 2026 disclosure; keep sharing private | Decide after review |
| Teams changing domains soon | Several complaints about lock-outs after email changes | Plan the change with support |
Six real gaps, not manufactured ones.
A months-long disclosure dispute in 2026, even if now fixed.
3-month deletion, archive after 3 days, AI capped for life.
Fees are non-refundable unless agreed otherwise.
Ask AI caps, premium transcription plan and user counts differ across pages.
Paid users report long lock-outs after email or domain changes.
No video or screen share without the bot.
tl;dv wins on its free plan and EU base. Others win on polish or audio.
| If you mostly need... | Compare tl;dv with... |
|---|---|
| Transcripts and meeting search | Otter.ai review |
| A note taker with deep integrations | Fireflies.ai review |
| Editing recordings into clips or podcasts | Descript review |
| Dictating notes after the call | Wispr Flow review |
| Noise cancellation plus notes | Krisp (no JAVIS review yet) |
No affiliate link on this page.
JAVIS has no affiliate relationship with tl;dv, and every tl;dv link here goes to tldv.io or its help center directly. Nobody paid for placement; the pricing, security incident and user criticism above come from tl;dv's own pages, the researcher's disclosure and public reviews.
Start on the free plan and check your sharing and consent settings first.
Open tl;dvRead the alternative that matches your real question.
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Questions people are actually asking
Is tl;dv free?
Yes. The free plan has unlimited recordings and transcripts, AI notes for your first 10 meetings (then the first 10 minutes of each), and stores recordings for 3 months.
How much does tl;dv cost in October 2026?
Pro is $29 per seat a month or $18 billed yearly; Business is $39 or $29 billed yearly; Enterprise is custom.
Can tl;dv record without a bot?
Yes, with the desktop app, which records audio only (your microphone and system audio) on any meeting platform.
Was tl;dv hacked?
In August 2026 a researcher published that meeting metadata was readable by logged-in users and that live calls could be joined. tl;dv says only metadata was exposed, public content was opt-in, and both vectors are closed.
Does tl;dv train AI on my meetings?
Its security page says no customer data is used to train the AI.
Does tl;dv give refunds?
Its terms say fees are non-refundable unless otherwise agreed.
Where is my data stored?
In European data centers, per tl;dv's security page; you can choose EU or US hosting for its AI.
What are the best tl;dv alternatives?
Otter.ai and Fireflies.ai for note taking, Descript for editing recordings, and your meeting app's built-in notes for basics.
Where this came from, and when it was checked.
Pricing and plans: tldv.io/app/pricing (monthly and annual views, comparison table, FAQ), as of Oct 5, 2026.
Billing and terms: tl;dv terms of service (tldx Solutions GmbH); help center "What are the limits of the Free plan?", "How long do you keep my recordings?", "How to cancel my Pro subscription" and "What is tl;dv's pricing?".
Product: help center "AI Meeting Notes", "How to use Ask tl;dv AI", "Why do we use a bot?", "Recording without a bot", "Consent Collection", "MCP", "Mobile App" and "Why choose Whisper as a transcription model"; tl;dv security page.
Security incident: researcher's post "tl;dv (Too Lazy; Didn't Validate): 181,874 Meetings Left Wide Open" (bobdahacker.com) and tl;dv's "Our thoughts on the darkreading.com article" by its CTO (Aug 5, 2026); Hacker News comments 49243960, 49243523 and 49172254.
Users: Chrome Web Store listing and reviews (4.6 from 597, 400,000 users), Trustpilot profile for tldv.io (2.1 from 10; dates in UTC), App Store (US) and Google Play (US storefront), as of Oct 5, 2026.
Official videos: youtube.com/watch?v=t42a3tmO31Q and rs9_M60t-m0 from the official tl;dv channel.
JAVIS Fit Score (70/100): editorial composite of free-plan value (strong), AI notes and sales features (good), EU hosting and stated certifications (good), price (good), security track record in 2026 (weak), support on account changes (weak). Weighted by editorial judgement.
