Mentalyc alternative
A Mentalyc alternative: TherapyDraft keeps audio on your Mac
Mentalyc is the best-known AI scribe for therapists. It works well. It also requires uploading session audio to Mentalyc's cloud and trusting a BAA. TherapyDraft is for clinicians who want the same SOAP, DAP, BIRP and GIRP output without that upload ever happening.
TL;DR
Mentalyc drafts your note in its cloud after you upload the session. TherapyDraft drafts your note on your own Mac using whisper.cpp and a quantized 14B model; session audio, transcript, and draft text never open a network socket. Pricing is comparable — Mentalyc starts at $19.99/mo, TherapyDraft is $39/mo flat with unlimited sessions. If your primary concern is cost-per-session, Mentalyc wins. If your primary concern is that a subpoena, subprocessor breach, or vendor policy change cannot expose your clients, TherapyDraft is the one that makes that guarantee architectural instead of contractual.
Why therapists look for a Mentalyc alternative
Mentalyc is a capable product with a signed BAA and a reasonable privacy posture for a cloud vendor. The reasons to look elsewhere are specific:
- Session audio leaves your control. Even with a BAA, the recording is transmitted, stored, processed, and eventually deleted somewhere you can't inspect. That's a category of exposure some clinicians are no longer willing to accept in 2026.
- BAA coverage is contractual, not physical. A breach at a subprocessor (transcription provider, LLM provider, cloud storage) is still a breach. The BAA distributes liability; it doesn't prevent exposure. Recent subpoena activity against AI vendors has made this concrete for many private-practice clinicians.
- Subscription comes with vendor lock. If Mentalyc changes its privacy policy, terms, or pricing, you either accept the change or migrate your workflow. A tool that runs on your own hardware doesn't have those upstream dependencies.
- Client disclosure is harder. Telling a client "my scribe uses an out-of-network cloud vendor" is a different conversation from "my scribe runs on this laptop and nothing leaves the room."
How TherapyDraft is different
TherapyDraft is a signed, notarized macOS app. You record or import audio; whisper.cpp transcribes locally; a 4-bit quantized Qwen 2.5 14B model drafts the note locally via MLX on Apple Silicon. The app declares two network endpoints in its macOS entitlements: api.stripe.com (for license activation) and update.therapydraft.com (for app version check). Session audio, transcript text, and draft output are not allowed to reach any host. The macOS sandbox enforces this at the OS level — it is not a setting you or the vendor can toggle at runtime.
The clinical output is the same SOAP, DAP, BIRP, and GIRP formats every cloud scribe ships. The review workflow is the same: read the draft, edit, paste into your EHR. The difference is where the inference ran.
Feature comparison
| Mentalyc | TherapyDraft | |
|---|---|---|
| Where inference runs | Mentalyc cloud | Your Mac |
| Session audio leaves device | Yes (uploaded) | No (enforced by macOS entitlements) |
| HIPAA posture | Contractual (signed BAA) | Architectural (no PHI transmission) |
| Note formats | SOAP, DAP, BIRP, GIRP, intake, treatment plan | SOAP, DAP, BIRP, GIRP (v1) |
| One-shot style matching from your own notes | Limited | Yes (5 example notes, unlimited use) |
| Tamper-evident inference log | Server-side audit log | Hash-chained JSONL on your disk |
| Runs offline | No (cloud required) | Yes (airplane mode supported) |
| Platform | Web (any OS) | macOS 14+ on Apple Silicon |
| Starting price | $19.99/mo (entry tier) | $39/mo or $349/yr |
| Free trial | 10 sessions | 10 sessions, no credit card |
The architectural wedge, stated plainly
Mentalyc's trust model is "we promise, and the BAA makes that promise legally binding." TherapyDraft's trust model is "the laptop on your desk is the only thing that ever sees the audio, and you can verify that with Activity Monitor." Both are real trust models. They answer different questions.
If your practice's threat model is "I need a reputable vendor with a BAA, and I trust them to not screw up," Mentalyc is the right product. Most of the market lives here, and there is nothing wrong with it. If your practice's threat model is "I want a tool where there is no vendor to trust because there is no data to leak," TherapyDraft is the shape of that tool.
Price math for a typical caseload
A solo private-practice therapist billing 25 sessions a week pays Mentalyc's Growth tier (~$39/mo at 2026 rates) for unlimited notes, or the per-session plan at higher volume. TherapyDraft is $39/mo flat at that same caseload, or $349/yr (~$29/mo) paid annually. At the entry tier Mentalyc is cheaper (~$20/mo) with session caps. The price differential is small; the decision is not really a cost decision unless you're on the lowest Mentalyc tier.
When Mentalyc is still the right choice
Be honest with yourself before switching. Mentalyc is the right tool if:
- You are not on a Mac. TherapyDraft is Apple Silicon only in v1; Windows support is on the roadmap but not shipped. If you're on a Windows machine, Mentalyc is the answer today.
- You need intake notes, treatment plans, or the group-therapy note format. TherapyDraft v1 ships the four core progress-note formats; specialty templates come later.
- You want a web UI you can open on any device. TherapyDraft is a native Mac app by design — the design is what makes the privacy guarantee enforceable.
- Your practice is already comfortable with cloud scribes and the BAA-plus-insurance model, and your primary concern is onboarding speed. Mentalyc's cloud SaaS is faster to set up than a desktop install.
How to try TherapyDraft without committing
The private beta is free for 10 sessions, no credit card required. Install the signed .dmg, give the app microphone access, draft your first note. If the output quality and the workflow don't improve on your current setup, uninstall; nothing has been uploaded anywhere.