# Circleback vs Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) (slim)

> Circleback scores 67.6 (B) to Zoom Realtime Media Streams's 58.3 (C) for meeting transcripts. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/circleback-vs-zoom-rtms.md (~4,100 tokens) · this version ~2,380 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/circleback-vs-zoom-rtms.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/circleback-vs-zoom-rtms
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp · Updated: 2026-11-07
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)

Circleback scores 67.6 (B) on agent readiness against Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS)'s 58.3 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Both do meeting transcripts.

- Circleback: B 67.6, rank #315 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/circleback.min.md
- Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS): C 58.3, rank #753 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/zoom-rtms.min.md
- Circleback, good for Agents that need a person's meeting notes, transcripts and action items from a notetaker they already use, including on Free. Ahead on Reliability, 77 against 67; Schema & documentation, 81 against 71; Agent ergonomics, 72 against 59; Payments & pricing, 30 against 0; Maintenance & community, 78 against 73.
- Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS), good for Apps that need live Zoom media or transcripts without a bot, including in-meeting agents.

| Category | Circleback | Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 77 | 67 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 81 | 71 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 72 | 59 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 61 | 63 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 30 | 0 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 78 | 73 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 70 | 73 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Circleback | Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | Circleback AI, Inc. | Zoom Communications, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://circleback.ai/api/mcp` | `https://api.zoom.us/v2` |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | websocket, HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth |
| Pricing | Freemium | Paid |
| Licence | Proprietary service under Circleback's Terms of Service. The `@circleback/cli` npm package is MIT | Proprietary service under the Zoom API Licence and Terms of Use. The `@zoom/rtms` SDK is MIT on npm |
| Tools exposed | 28 | none |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| MCP registry | `ai.circleback/circleback` | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-11-03 | 2026-10-30 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-04-07 | 2025-07-16 |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2024-07-15 | 2026-09-17 |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text | yes |

Why the edge:
- Payments & pricing, Circleback +30: Circleback 30 (No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Seat prices are public, $15 and $25 a user a month, with nothing priced per call (10). The Free plan includes API, MCP and CLI access with 30 days of history and costs nothing. A card isn't mentioned for it (20). A person signs up in a browser and creates a key or approves OAuth (0). 0+10+20+0 = 30.); Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) 0 (No x402, MPP or L402 (0). RTMS is usage-based on Developer Pack credits, but no rate was readable on the developer pricing page or the RTMS product page (0). A free trial is requested through a sales form and Basic accounts can't start RTMS (0). A person creates the app, buys credits and submits the app for review (0). 0+0+0+0 = 0.)
- Agent ergonomics, Circleback +13: Circleback 72 (28 MCP tools (15 for 11 to 30), plus 5 for the read-only scope that leaves write tools failing. The API lists return pages with filters (20 of 25). Cursor pagination through a Link header and filters by attendee, tag, folder, ownership and status (20). Errors carry a message and a code such as `RATE_LIMITED` (16 of 20). No idempotency key, and MCP annotations couldn't be read without a sign-in. Read-only keys and scope keep writes off (8 of 20). Few required parameters. The only official client is the Node CLI, with `--json` output (8 of 15). 20+20+16+8+8 = 72.); Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) 59 (Streaming reading of the checklist. Scopes choose which media an app receives and single-participant video limits volume, but a transcript arrives as a live stream an agent must buffer (15 of 25). Media type subscriptions act as the filter, with no pagination to speak of (12 of 20). Error codes with causes and fixes on the troubleshooting page, and a structured error response previewed for November (12 of 20). Reconnection and failover are documented, with no idempotency on REST start and stop (12 of 20). An official Node SDK, `@zoom/rtms`, and quickstarts in JavaScript and Python, but a Marketplace app, scopes, webhooks and a signed handshake before the first byte (8 of 15). 15+12+12+12+8 = 59.)
- Reliability, Circleback +10: Circleback 77 (Graded on the hosted REST API and MCP server with the hosted lines. incident.io status page at status.circleback.ai with four components, none of them the API (20). Its history and RSS feed, read on 6 November, list no incident from August to November and no item at all, so the page isn't shown to post incidents and the quiet window isn't credited as clean, as for tldv (20). Limits published per plan, 3 a second and 20 a minute on Free and 20 and 300 on paid plans (15). 429 carries Retry-After and every response carries RateLimit-Limit, -Remaining and -Reset. No idempotency key or safe-retry guidance for writes (12 of 15). No SLA found in the Terms or on the pricing page (0). The API has no beta label (10). 20+20+15+12+0+10 = 77.); Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) 67 (Graded on the hosted RTMS service with the hosted lines. www.zoomstatus.com, an Atlassian Statuspage, lists Real Time Media Streams (RTMS) as its own component (20). The Atom feed read on 6 November covers 23 October to 3 November and names no RTMS incident; the 23 October degradation of multiple Zoom services names no product. The window from 8 August to 22 October is drawn by script and robots.txt closes /api/, so, as for zoom-scheduler, the line is 10. Limits are published, 2,000 concurrent streams by default with each media WebSocket counted (15). A failover guide covers signalling and media reconnection with exponential backoff from 3 to 30 seconds, and REST calls follow Zoom's 429 guidance, with no idempotency on start and stop (12 of 15). No SLA found for RTMS (0). RTMS for Meetings carries no beta label (10). 20+10+15+12+0+10 = 67.)
- Schema & documentation, Circleback +10: Circleback 81 (Each reference page embeds the OpenAPI 3.2 operation for its endpoint, but no single spec file is linked, and MCP input schemas need a sign-in (20 of 25). llms.txt and a Markdown copy of each docs page (10). Operation descriptions state what is returned and who may act, such as only the owner deleting a meeting, and the update call explains replace semantics (16 of 20). Typed parameters with enums and defaults, such as `ownership` All, Mine or Shared (13 of 15). curl examples, a JSON error envelope with `error` and `code`, and 400 and 429 responses per operation (12 of 15). Paths carry no version, and a public releases page dates each entry (10 of 15). 20+10+16+13+12+10 = 81.); Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) 71 (No machine-readable contract for the WebSocket protocol (no AsyncAPI), and the REST start and stop calls sit in Zoom's reference with no spec file linked (8 of 25). llms.txt and a Markdown copy of each page (10). Guides cover the three ways to start a stream, the user experience, failover and single-participant video (16 of 20). Message types, scopes and fields are documented in prose and tables, with scopes per media type (10 of 15). Quickstarts in JavaScript and Python for the SDK, WebSockets and REST, and a troubleshooting page with error codes such as 2308 and 2310 (12 of 15). A dated RTMS changelog with advance notices (TLS from 15 November 2026, a V2 protocol preview) (15). 8+10+16+10+12+15 = 71.)
- Maintenance & community, Circleback +5: Circleback 78 (`@circleback/cli` 1.2.1 published on 3 November 2026 and a release entry on 2 November (30). Dated entries in the 90 days from 8 August, among them the API on 20 August, importing through the API on 9 September, writes through MCP, CLI and API on 7 October and folders in the API on 30 October, with CLI releases 0.9.0 to 1.2.1 since 6 October (20). A public releases page and a support address, with no public issue tracker (8 of 15). In the official MCP registry as ai.circleback/circleback (15). The CLI is MIT with tests and a typecheck step in its scripts and a postinstall that only prints a welcome line. Its repository isn't public (5 of 10). 30+20+8+15+5 = 78.); Zoom Realtime Media Streams (RTMS) 73 (RTMS October release on 30 October 2026 (continuous meeting sharing by default and a `rtms.request_status` webhook) (30). Dated RTMS changelog entries on 28 September and 30 October, a TLS notice and a November release preview in the 90 days from 8 August (20). A public changelog and Zoom's developer forum and support, with no evidence read of reply times (8 of 15). The official `@zoom/rtms` SDK is at 1.1.0 from 16 April 2026, behind the protocol changes since (10 of 15). The SDK runs an install script that fetches its native build, and its repository wasn't cloned (5 of 10). 30+20+8+10+5 = 73.)