⚔️ Abrège vs Zapia
Zapia transcribes for free. But the sender sees the transcript.
Zapia stopped replying on WhatsApp on 22 December 2025, after Meta's policy change. It now works as an app you link to your WhatsApp: turn on automatic transcription and, when someone sends you a voice note, Zapia posts the transcript in that chat, from your number. The person who sent it sees it. With Abrège you forward the note to a separate contact, and nobody else sees a thing.
When is Zapia a good choice?
Let's be fair: Zapia is a much bigger product than Abrège. It's a free personal assistant built by BrainLogic AI in Uruguay, which says it has over 7 million users in Latin America, and it also handles your calendar, email, reminders, price comparisons and scheduled WhatsApp messages. Its transcription is free, automatic once switched on (no forwarding needed), can be turned off per conversation, and you can ask it to summarise an audio in bullet points. If you want an all-round assistant and don't mind the transcript showing in the chat, it's a strong option.
What does Abrège do differently from Zapia?
The trade-off is in how it reaches your WhatsApp. Zapia needs an app installed and your WhatsApp account linked to it. Its automatic transcript is a message sent from your number into the conversation, so the sender knows you ran their voice note through a transcriber: fine with a friend, awkward with a client or your manager. The manual route (sharing the audio to the Zapia app) avoids that, but takes you out of WhatsApp. Abrège asks for none of this: no app, no account linking, you forward the note to the Abrège contact and the reply comes back in that private chat. Forwarding doesn't notify the original sender. You get the key points first, then the full transcription.
The comparison
Abrège vs Zapia, point by point
| 🍿 Abrège | Zapia | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A WhatsApp contact for voice notes | A general AI assistant app |
| Setup | None, save the contact | Install the app, link your WhatsApp |
| How a note gets processed | You forward it | Automatically, or you share it to the app |
| Who sees the result | Only you, in your chat with Abrège | Auto mode: posted in the chat, the sender sees it |
| Summary | On every note, by default | On request, in bullet points |
| Other features | None, voice notes only | Calendar, email, reminders, scheduling |
| Price | Free 5/month, then from €3/month | Free core; Pro and Ultra (prices not shown) |
Comparison checked and updated in September 2026. Source: zapia.com.
« Zapia replies in the chat. Abrège replies to you alone. »
Choose Zapia if...
- → You want a free all-round assistant, not just a voice-note tool.
- → You'd like transcription to happen on its own, with no forwarding.
- → The sender seeing the transcript in the chat doesn't bother you.
Choose Abrège if...
- You want to read voice notes without the sender seeing anything.
- You'd rather not install an app or link your WhatsApp account.
- You want a summary of every note, not only when you ask for one.
Frequently asked questions
- Not as a contact you can message. Zapia's own blog says that from 22 December 2025 it can no longer reply on WhatsApp, following Meta's policy on general-purpose AI assistants. It now works through its app, which you link to your WhatsApp account.
- With automatic transcription on, yes: Zapia sends the transcript in the conversation on your behalf, from your number, so the person who sent the audio sees that message. You can switch it off per conversation. With Abrège, you forward the note to a separate contact; the original sender isn't notified and sees nothing.
- Zapia's transcription is free, and that's a real advantage. Abrège has 5 free summaries a month, then paid plans from €3 a month (prices in euros). What you get for it: nothing posted in the original chat, no app or account linking, and a summary on every note.
- Meta's rule, in force since 15 January 2026, targets general-purpose AI assistants on WhatsApp. Single-purpose services like Abrège, which only process the voice notes you forward, were never in that category.
Other comparisons
More on the blog
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