Echo
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The quick answer
Use Record a Meeting in Echo’s menu, or hold Control and say “record the meeting”. Echo transcribes on your Mac and makes notes when you stop. Your microphone is labeled You; the call audio is Them. It does not identify each participant by name.
Prepare your Mac before the call
Echo 1.2 and later can transcribe a meeting from your microphone and the sound playing on your Mac. It works alongside your calling app, without adding a bot to the call. You need macOS 26, Apple silicon, and Echo’s speech model downloaded before you start.
Let the other people know you are recording. For a first test, use a short call with someone who is happy to help. Headphones make it easier to keep your voice separate from the call audio.
Echo needs Microphone access for your voice and System Audio Recording access for the other side. The second permission is requested when you first record a meeting. You can review it in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Screen & System Audio Recording. Echo also downloads a small voice-detection model for meetings and files.
Start and stop a meeting
- Join your call and check that you can hear the other people.
- Hold Control, say “record the meeting”, and release. You can also choose Record a Meeting in Echo’s menu.
- Look at the live transcript in the Meetings window. Speak a sentence and check that both sides appear as expected.
- At the end, press Stop in the Meetings window, use Echo’s menu, or hold Control and say “stop recording”.
If you prefer to click, hold Control without speaking for two seconds. The command menu stays open with its microphone off, so you can choose a command without saying it aloud.
Turn the transcript into useful notes
When you stop, Echo prepares a title, a summary, decisions, action items, and open questions. In AI mode, your chosen AI prepares those notes. In Off and Apple modes, notes use Apple’s on-device model when it is available. The speech transcript itself is produced on your Mac.
From Echo 1.3, the AI that wrote the notes then adds a two-sentence recap and a short follow-up message you could send to the others. They appear as the first message of the meeting’s chat, below the notes. Ask there about anything that was said, or have the AI rework the notes, for example to make them shorter. Undo puts the previous notes back.
A useful review is to compare each decision and action item with the transcript. Check names, dates, numbers, and who agreed to do what before you share the notes. A transcript or generated summary can contain mistakes.
A review you can use
Decision: move the launch to Thursday.
Action: send the revised outline before the review.
Open question: who owns the final check?
Echo labels your microphone as You and the Mac’s audio as Them, and the transcript reads like a conversation: your words on the right, theirs on the left. “Them” represents the other side of the call; it does not identify each participant by name.
Find, copy, and export a meeting
Use the Meetings window to search saved meetings, select one, and read its notes and transcript. Copy the notes or transcript, or export the meeting as Markdown to keep it alongside your project documents. To continue in a chat app, Send to… opens the notes, with or without the transcript, in a new Claude or ChatGPT chat, ready for you to read before sending; that app needs to be installed on your Mac. Delete meetings you no longer need from the same window.
The records stay on your Mac. Echo discards meeting audio after transcription rather than keeping a playable recording. If your workflow needs an audio archive, Echo’s saved meeting is a text record.
Choose where the notes are made
For a local workflow, prepare the speech models and use the on-device notes option or a local AI model. If you choose a cloud AI, the transcript is sent to that provider under your own account to make the notes, and the follow-up and the chat’s answers come from the same provider. Your calling app, a chat app you send the notes to, and any place you share the exported notes have their own data handling.
The chat names the AI answering you. It may keep using the provider that wrote the notes, even after you change dictation mode. If Apple’s model is unavailable, chat uses your configured AI. A follow-up draft is prepared for you to review; it is not sent to participants.
See Echo’s privacy details for local storage and retention, or use the offline setup guide to prepare your speech and cleanup models before disconnecting. Already have a recording? Follow the audio and video transcription guide.