Both live in the MacBook notch and stay invisible on Zoom. The real split is how they follow you: Tellie tracks the words you actually say, while Avocado scrolls to the sound of your voice. And Tellie is a one-time $29, where Avocado is a subscription. Here is the honest breakdown, including where Avocado is the better pick.
Free to try as a teleprompter. 10 days of Pro on the house, no card.
Avocado is a polished notch prompter, and like most of them it does sound-paced scrolling: it moves while it hears you talking and pauses when you go quiet. That keeps a rhythm, but it does not know which words you said. Skip a line, double back, or make your point in different words, and it keeps rolling to its own clock.
Tellie does word-level tracking. On-device speech recognition matches your spoken words to the script, so the read line sits on the exact words leaving your mouth. Backtrack and it follows you back; ad-lib and it waits, then picks up where you return. That one difference is what makes the must-cover coaching below possible. Your voice never leaves your Mac. Voice sync vs. word tracking, explained →
Both apps can time a rehearsal. Only one watches whether you actually made your point. Mark your must-cover sections and the exact lines you need to land, and Stagehand checks each one off the instant you say it, in any wording, then warns you by name when a point is about to run past your time. Stop, and Take Coach grades the take and names the single thing to fix next. Avocado's rehearsal history tells you how long you took; Stagehand tells you what you left out. All on-device.
Both are native Mac notch teleprompters that hide on screen share. Here is where they diverge. Prices as published by each maker; check the latest before you buy.
| Feature | Tellie | Avocado |
|---|---|---|
| Follows your voice | Word-level: your actual words | Sound-paced: scrolls while you talk |
| Lives in the MacBook notch | Yes | Yes |
| Invisible on Zoom & recordings | Yes | Yes |
| Must-cover coaching | Yes: Stagehand marks + Take Coach | Rehearsal history & timing |
| Phone or tablet as prompter + remote | Companion (Pro beta) | Director Mode + Viewer, up to 5 devices |
| Slide notes | Keynote (Presenter Magic) | PowerPoint import |
| Runs on-device (nothing leaves your Mac) | Yes | Yes |
| Price | Free tier · Pro $29 once | Free tier · Pro $7.99/mo or $79.99/yr |
The honest summary: Tellie leads on word-level following and a one-time price; Avocado is further along on multi-device prompting and PowerPoint. See the full field guide →
Avocado is a genuinely good app, and it does some things Tellie does not do yet. If you regularly run a shoot with a second operator driving the prompter, or you need the script mirrored across several devices at once, Avocado's Director Mode and Viewer are more mature than Tellie's Companion (which is a Pro beta). If your notes live in PowerPoint, Avocado imports it directly, where Tellie's Presenter Magic is Keynote-only. And if you would rather start on a permanent free tier that already includes voice scrolling and pay monthly only when you need more, Avocado's pricing fits that shape.
Pick Tellie if what matters most is a prompter that follows the words you actually say, tells you when you are about to skip the point you came to make, and costs $29 once instead of every month.
Neither is better for everyone. Tellie is the pick if you want a prompter that follows the exact words you say and coaches you to cover your key points, at a one-time $29. Avocado is the pick if you need mature multi-device prompting, a second-operator remote, or PowerPoint import today. Both are native Mac notch prompters that hide on screen share.
How they follow your voice. Avocado scrolls to the sound of you talking; Tellie matches the words you say against your script, so it follows you through skips, backtracks, and ad-libs, and can check off the points you actually made.
Over time, yes. Tellie Pro is a one-time $29; Avocado Pro is a subscription ($7.99/mo or $79.99/yr as published). Both have a free tier, and Tellie includes a 10-day Pro trial with no card.
“It truly is a magnificent app.”
Sprague Theobald · Emmy-winning writer and producer
Download Tellie free and see the difference on your own script: it follows what you actually say, and Pro is $29 once instead of every month. Ten days of Pro on the house, no card.
Download TellieMore: Best teleprompter for Mac · The full field guide · Tellie Pro