Summary
This comparison turns on what surrounds the note. Heidi drafts an excellent note and runs the only free tier in this category that is actually usable, though since August 2026 its pricing page shows tiers without figures.1
Two things decide it. EHR push is gated above Heidi's entry plan, so the number you were quoted may not include the thing you wanted. And the best randomised result any scribe has produced is 41 seconds a note.2 The purchase that changes the evening covers the letters, the coding and the front desk, not the note alone.
Leave the room with the note, the letters, the codes and the cited answers already written. Fourteen days free, then one published price.
Book a demo| What you get | Heidi | wai |
|---|---|---|
| The note drafted from the room | Yes | Yes |
| A briefing before the patient sits down | Not offered | Yes, built from the chart |
| Referral and clinic letters | Yes | Yes |
| ICD-10 coding attached to the decision | Yes | Yes, drafted against MDM |
| Push into your EHR | Practice tier and above11Heidi Clinician was published at $150 per user per month billed annually until August 2026, and the pricing page now lists tiers without figures, checked 30 August 2026. The free tier offers unlimited basic transcription. EHR push-to-chart is gated to Practice tier and above. Heidi self-declares MHRA Class I with Class IIa reported in progress. Confirm current terms with Heidi. | Yes, every plan |
| The phone, email and WhatsApp answered | Not offered | Yes, same record |
| Eligibility checked at booking | Not offered | Yes |
| Deposits, invoices, waitlist backfill | Not offered | Yes |
| Published price | $150 until Aug 2026, now unpublished | See pricing |
What Heidi is good at
The note. Heidi has the widest language coverage in the category, the largest installed base of the clinician-purchased tools, and a free tier that lets you find out whether you like this before you pay anything. Nobody else offers that and we do not either.
It self-declares MHRA Class I with Class IIa reported in progress. Self-declared means no external assessment, which is normal at Class I and worth understanding rather than worrying about. In a survey of 121 AI scribe products only 7 percent claimed Class I at all.33Kaczmarek K, et al. Trust Me, I Might be a Medical Device. Research Square preprint, March 2026. Survey of 121 AI scribe products. Heidi is in the honest minority.
Where the tiers bite
Push-to-chart sits on Practice tier and above. If you are comparing Heidi's quoted number against another product's, check whether the comparison includes the integration you actually need, because a note you copy and paste is a note you handled twice.
What the evidence says
Heidi has no randomised trial. Neither do we. Nabla does, and it cut note-writing time 9.5 percent, about 41 seconds, across roughly 72,000 encounters.22Lukac PJ, Turner W, Vangala S, et al. Ambient AI Scribes in Clinical Practice, A Randomized Trial. NEJM AI 2025;2(12). 238 physicians, 14 specialties, approximately 72,000 encounters. Neither arm reduced after-hours record time.
The half nobody compares
Heidi covers the consultation. It does not answer your phone, book, take a deposit, check eligibility or backfill a cancellation, and it does not claim to.
Roughly 13 to 19 percent of appointments are missed at about $196 each, and about 27 percent of claim denials are eligibility errors caught before the patient arrives or not at all. Neither is a Heidi failing. Both are outside what an ambient scribe is.
The number this comparison misses
A scribe subscription buys an excellent note and reaches none of what follows. From 2026 your E/M level turns on Medical Decision Making, so the note is the evidence for the code and the code is the money.55From 2026, Medical Decision Making is the primary basis for E/M level selection. AAPC reports up to 19 percent of E/M visits undercoded at roughly $37 each. Reported Medicare Advantage downcoding runs $42 to $74 per visit. Up to 19 percent of E/M visits are undercoded at roughly $37 each, and Medicare Advantage downcoding takes $42 to $74 off a visit without ever appearing as a denial.
A fluent note with thin MDM makes you faster at losing that. Heidi will not tell you this and neither will anyone else selling you a note, because none of us publishes a variance figure. Ask us all.
Price
Heidi listed $150 per user per month billed annually until August 2026 and its pricing page now shows tiers without figures, checked 30 August 2026, alongside the free tier. We publish on one page. Telling you the number without a call is the correct behaviour, it should not be remarkable, and for now only one of us is doing it.
Which one
Choose Heidi if
- You want the note drafted and your letters, coding and front desk are handled elsewhere.
- You consult across many languages and need the widest coverage available.
- You want to try a real free tier before paying anyone anything.
Choose wai if
- Your evening is letters, codes, results and callbacks rather than notes.
- You want the briefing assembled from the chart before the patient sits down.
- You want the front desk and the consultation on one record.
- You want the coding drafted against the MDM criteria that decide the level.
What we are not claiming
Heidi has a free tier and we do not. Heidi has wider language coverage and a larger installed base. If the note is your whole problem, Heidi is the better purchase and this page will not talk you out of it.
Frequently asked questions
Is Heidi or wai better at drafting notes?
What surrounds the note decides the comparison. Heidi is the most used ambient scribe in the world, drafting notes in 110 languages across more than two million consults a week, and Beth Israel Lahey Health moved it to all of its physicians in April 2026 after a 1,000-clinician pilot. On the note alone it is excellent, and until August 2026 it listed 150 dollars a month, 100 dollars less than wai Clinician. Its pricing page now shows tiers without figures, and on Heidi's Clinician plan the note does not write itself into your record, because push-to-chart needs the Practice tier or above. Heidi Comms needs a sales call and has no published price. In the UK and EU, cited answers do not run during the consult at all. wai publishes one price for the note, the letters, the coding and the cited answers, with EHR push on every plan.
Does wai have published clinical evidence?
No. wai has no peer-reviewed trials published and does not claim any. Heidi has published NHS service evaluations and the Beth Israel Lahey Health rollout, where 89 percent of adopters were satisfied with note quality and 74 percent reported less time working after hours. That is more evidence than we have, and we would tell you so in the room. Worth knowing how it was measured though. Those are physician survey responses. The only randomised trial in the category measured the record itself against a control group and found no reduction in after-hours EHR time on either product tested. Both findings can be true. People can feel lighter and still finish at the same hour. What wai offers instead of a case study is a 90 day pilot that ends with three numbers from your own clinic, revenue, hours saved and patients cared for.
Is Heidi a smaller subscription than wai?
It was, on the last published sticker. Heidi Clinician listed 150 dollars per user per month billed annually until August 2026, when its pricing page stopped showing figures, and there is a free tier with unlimited basic transcription. wai Clinician is a published price after a 14 day free trial, and both companies offer a 14 day trial. Note for note, Heidi was less expensive on its last published figure and the gap was roughly one missed appointment. Check what the quoted number includes before you decide. EHR push-to-chart is gated to the Practice tier and above, so on Clinician the note still moves by copy and paste, and no tier now shows a published figure.
Go home when your last patient does.
Thirty minutes, your own workflow, running live. Bring the list that keeps you late.
About this article. Written and published by wai, a competitor of Heidi, and we have said where Heidi is the better purchase. Heidi pricing, tier gating and regulatory status are from public sources current at the updated date above and change frequently, so confirm directly. The randomised trial cited is independent of us and Nabla, not wai, holds the only randomised win. wai has no peer-reviewed clinical trials published to date and does not claim any. All names are marks belonging to their owners.