How to record an in-person meeting on your Mac

Put your Mac in the middle of the table, open Voice Memos and click Record. That gets you the sound and, where Apple offers it, a transcript. Apple Notes does the same inside a note, with a live transcript on a Mac with M1 or later.

Neither one writes up the meeting for you. For a summary, the decisions and your to-dos afterwards, you need a note taker that works in the room, not only on calls. Koi's In person mode is one: it records through your microphone, keeps the sound to play back, and writes the notes when you say yes.

We make Koi, so read the Koi part with that in mind. Apple's details come from its user guides, and the other apps' from their own sites, checked October 16, 2026.

A laptop on the table isn't a yes. In many places recording a conversation needs everyone's agreement, in person as much as on a call, and workplaces often have rules of their own. Laws differ, so check where you are. This isn't legal advice.

Apple's guides describe no notice when Voice Memos or Notes records, and Koi doesn't announce itself, so say it when the meeting starts: “mind if I record this for the notes?” If someone joins halfway, say it again. If anyone says no, don't record, and keep the recording to the people who agreed to it.

1. Open Voice Memos and click Record at the bottom left.
2. Pause and Resume for a break, so it stays one recording.
3. Click Done when the meeting ends.
4. Click the Transcription button to read what was said, live or afterwards.

Per Apple's Voice Memos guide, the transcript is searchable, you can copy it into another document, and Writing Tools can summarize it with Apple Intelligence. Transcription isn't offered in every country or region.

1. Open a note for the meeting.
2. Click the attachment button in the toolbar and choose Record Audio.
3. Click Record, and open Transcription to watch the words come in.
4. Click Pause, then Done, at the end.

Per Apple's Notes guide, transcription needs a Mac with M1 or later and a supported language. The More button has Find in Transcript, Add Transcript to Note and Copy Transcript, and Apple Intelligence can write a summary.

Koi's Record asks what you're recording. Online call is for Zoom, Meet and Teams. In person is for a meeting, a class or a talk in the room: it hears the room through your microphone alone, needs no Screen Recording permission, and films nothing.

1. Put your Mac where it hears everyone, in the middle of the table if you can.
2. Tap Fn + ⌃ and pick In person. Or choose Record a Meeting in Person from the menu bar, or, on a call with Koi, say "record this meeting".
3. Run the meeting. Each stretch of talk is transcribed on your Mac with Whisper as soon as it pauses.
4. At the end, tap the keys again, or click stop on Koi's dock.

The meeting is written onto a document in Recents as it goes, a paragraph every few stretches, with the sound kept on the page to play back. When you stop, it asks “Summarize this recording?”. Say yes and the transcript's words, never the sound, go to Koi's AI, which runs online, for a title, the summary, the decisions and your own to-dos as checkboxes. Dates the meeting agreed on are offered for Koi's calendar, to add or not. Say not now and nothing from the meeting leaves your Mac.

It pays off at the next meeting. A few minutes before a meeting on your calendar, Koi can offer “Brief me”, a short page from your past meetings and documents about it. And on a call with Koi you can ask “what did Sam say about pricing?” and it looks through your own pages, recordings and chats for the answer.

Koi needs macOS 14 or later and microphone access. Its server is asked before a recording starts, to check your plan, so you need a connection to begin. Recordings are unlimited on every plan: Pro is $20 a month, or $192 a year, after a 3-day free trial that needs a card, and Lifetime is $59 for the first 25 buyers, rising to $199. See the plans.

• It doesn't name speakers. An in-person page is what was heard, in paragraphs, not a script with names.
• It hears what one microphone hears. A long table or a quiet voice at the far end will have gaps.
• It doesn't filter the Mac's own sound out in person. A notification chime goes in too, so mute the Mac.
• It's Mac only, with no phone app, so the Mac has to be in the room.
• The notes need your yes each time, and go through Koi's AI online.

Each of these says it works in the room, per its own site:

• Otter's desktop app records in person as well as calls, with no bot. Its free plan caps each conversation at 30 minutes. Transcription is in Otter's cloud. See how Koi compares with Otter.ai.
• Zoom's My Notes takes notes in person and on Zoom, Teams and Meet. Zoom's free Basic plan includes three uses a month.
• Wispr Flow's Notetaker works in person and on calls, and names speakers after the meeting from the calendar invite and context. It comes with Flow, which has a free plan.
• Plaud is a pocket recorder, from $159, with a free plan of 300 minutes a month. Good when a laptop on the table would feel wrong.

If you need every speaker named, Wispr Flow's Notetaker does that and Koi doesn't. If you want the notes to start from your own Mac and stay there until you say yes, that's where Koi fits. More picks in the best AI note takers for Mac.

Pick Online call in Koi, not In person. Online call keeps two things apart: the microphone, which is You, and what the Mac plays, which is Them. In a hybrid meeting, everyone your microphone hears in the room is written as You, and the people on the call as Them, with the screen filmed too. It needs the Screen Recording permission. Recording a call is covered in recording a Zoom meeting and recording a Teams meeting.

• Middle of the table, lid open, nothing on top of the Mac.
• Mute the Mac's notifications before you start.
• Plug in for anything over an hour.
• Ask people to speak one at a time for the parts that matter, like decisions and dates.
• Record a ten-second test in the room and play it back.

• Only need the sound, maybe a transcript? Voice Memos.
• Want the recording inside your meeting note, on an M1 Mac or later? Apple Notes.
• Need every speaker named? A note taker that names speakers, like Wispr Flow's Notetaker.
• Want the summary, decisions and your to-dos written for you, from your own Mac? Koi's In person mode, once the room says yes.

Recording a class instead? See how to record a lecture on a Mac. For calls and every other app, see how to record a meeting on a Mac.