The best Riverside.fm alternatives on Mac in 2026
Riverside is excellent at recording separate guest tracks in the browser. It's also $288/year and asks every guest to sign up. If your podcast is two friends on a Mac, or a journalist on a deadline, you probably want one of these instead.
- Riverside.fm is best when you need separate per-guest video tracks and your guest will install the app.
- If you need one of those things and not the other, a Mac-native local recorder costs ~10× less.
- CallCove is the simplest option for Mac calls where the guest doesn't sign up for anything.
At a glance
| Tool | Best for | Mac native | Guest sign-up | Pricing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CallCove | One-host Mac, any call platform | Yes (menubar) | No | $15 once / $12/yr |
| Riverside.fm | Per-guest video tracks, browser-based | Browser-only | Yes (web app) | $24–$79/mo annual |
| Zencastr | Browser-recorded podcasts | Browser-only | Yes (web app) | Free / paid tiers |
| Audio Hijack | Pro audio routing + production | Yes (full app) | No | ~$79 once |
| SquadCast | Cloud-recorded interviews + AI | Browser-only | Yes (web app) | From $20/mo |
Pricing checked 2026-04-27 against each vendor's pricing page. Confirm before purchase — tiers shift.
CallCove — for the Mac host who doesn't want to onboard guests
CallCove sits in your Mac's menubar and captures whatever is playing through your speakers plus your microphone. Your guest joins the call however they normally would — Zoom, Meet, FaceTime, WhatsApp — and never installs anything. After the call, both sides are mixed into a single .m4a and transcribed on-device with Whisper.
- $15 lifetime or $12/year — the cheapest option in this list
- Guest never signs up or installs anything
- Records calls on every Mac platform: Zoom, Meet, Teams, FaceTime, WhatsApp, Discord
- On-device Whisper transcription, no cloud upload
- Works offline (after install)
- →One mixed track, not separate per-guest tracks
- →No video — audio + transcript only
- →Mac-only host (your guest can be on anything)
Pick if your podcast is conversation-driven, you cut audio (not multi-cam video), and you'd rather pay $15 once than ask guests to sign up.
Riverside.fm — the gold standard if guests will install the web app
Riverside captures separate, locally-recorded tracks for each participant and uploads them once the call ends. The result is studio-quality audio and 4K video per person. The catch: every guest opens a browser tab and consents to the recording session, which is friction for one-off interviews.
- Separate per-guest audio + video tracks
- Up to 4K video per participant
- Built-in editing and clip generation
- Live streaming (Pro+ tiers)
- →$288–$948/year for the working tiers
- →Guests must use the Riverside web app
- →Browser-dependent — Chrome/Edge work best
- →Free tier capped at 2 hours of multi-track
Pick if you publish video, want per-guest tracks, and your interview pipeline can absorb the guest-onboarding friction.
Zencastr — a Riverside competitor for audio-first podcasters
Zencastr is the long-standing browser-recording alternative to Riverside. Audio-first by design, more familiar to indie podcasters who started before Riverside existed.
- Local-first track recording per guest in the browser
- Free tier for occasional recording
- Audio post-production tools (loudness, leveling)
- →Same browser-onboarding friction as Riverside
- →Video features less mature than Riverside's
- →Recording-time and seat limits on lower tiers
Pick if you specifically want a Riverside-style flow but lean audio-only and prefer Zencastr's tone or pricing.
Audio Hijack — for the host who already runs a Mac audio chain
Audio Hijack is Rogue Amoeba's Mac-only studio in a box: source blocks, processing blocks, recorder blocks, RTMP outputs. If you produce a polished show with effects and live streaming, this is the deepest tool in the list. If you just want to hit record on a call, it's overkill.
- Per-source audio processing (compressor, EQ, gate)
- Live RTMP streaming to YouTube/Twitch
- Multi-output and aggregate-device routing
- On-device transcription added in Audio Hijack 4
- →~$79 one-time entry price
- →Steeper learning curve than menubar tools
- →No menubar one-click record
Pick if your show needs serious live audio routing and you'll use the depth.
SquadCast — cloud-recorded interviews with AI features
SquadCast (now part of Descript) records remote interviews in the cloud with separate tracks per guest and increasingly leans on AI tools for editing and transcripts.
- Per-guest separate tracks
- Strong integration with Descript editing flow
- AI-assisted editing and summaries
- →Subscription pricing
- →Browser-based — same guest-onboarding friction
- →Cloud-first model (data leaves your machine)
Pick if you already live in Descript and want a guest-recording front-end that fits that pipeline.
Common questions
What's the cheapest Riverside.fm alternative on Mac?+
CallCove at $15 lifetime (or $12/year). It's a Mac menubar app that records both sides of any call and transcribes on-device. It does not produce per-guest video tracks — that's Riverside's job, not CallCove's.
How do I record a podcast interview on Mac without making my guest sign up for anything?+
Use a host-side Mac recorder like CallCove. Your guest joins the call however they normally would (FaceTime, WhatsApp, Zoom, Meet) and never installs or signs up for a recording app. CallCove captures whatever your Mac is playing plus your mic.
Will I lose Riverside's separate guest tracks if I switch to a Mac-native recorder?+
Yes — CallCove and Audio Hijack record what plays through the Mac, mixed with your microphone. If you need each guest on a separate track for post-production isolation, Riverside or Zencastr are still the right tools.
Can I record a Riverside session locally as a backup on Mac?+
Yes — running CallCove in parallel during a Riverside session gives you a host-side mixed backup of everything, on-device. Useful insurance if a Riverside upload fails.
Is Riverside's free tier enough for a hobbyist podcast?+
It is for short, occasional recordings — 2 hours of multi-track recording at 720p. If you publish weekly, you'll hit the cap quickly and need Pro at $288/year. CallCove has no recording cap and a flat $15.
Other comparisons
Try CallCove for one interview
$15 lifetime or $12/year. Records both sides of any call on Mac. Transcribes on-device. Your guest doesn't need to sign up for anything.
Get CallCove