From pocket to transcript in under a minute
On a phone, the only permission is the microphone. There is no share picker and no tab to choose.
Open meetingsidekick.ai
In Safari, Chrome or whatever browser your phone has. Sign in free, or tap the trial and skip the account for your first 5 minutes.
Tick the box, press Start
You confirm you will handle consent. The browser asks for the microphone once. Tap Allow.
Set the phone down, screen up
Middle of the table, tab in front, phone unlocked. Say you are taking notes. The live transcript scrolls as people talk.
Press Stop for the notes
A summary with decisions and action items, an email recap, a share link, and a chat box scoped to that meeting. It is saved to your account, so it is on your laptop too.
Meetings that happen away from a computer
Client and sales visits
Across a desk or over coffee. Ask the meeting afterwards what you promised and by when.
Lectures and classes
With the instructor's permission, a phone on the desk captures the whole session. Ask it the three main points on the walk home.
Interviews and 1:1s
No laptop lid between you. The phone sits to the side and you keep eye contact.
Site visits and walk-throughs
Anywhere you would not open a laptop. The phone in your hand is the recorder.
Getting a clean recording, and the limits
Keep the tab open and the phone unlocked. Some phones cut the microphone when the screen locks or you switch apps. Turn auto-lock up for the meeting, leave the browser in front, and plug in if it is a long one.
Distance matters. A phone microphone hears the person next to it far better than the one across a big room. Put it in the middle of the table, or nearest the people who talk most. For a large room with a PA system, sit near a speaker.
A call on the phone itself is microphone-only. Phone browsers cannot capture the audio of a Zoom or Teams call running on the same phone. Put the call on speaker, or join from a laptop and use Chrome or Edge there to share the tab audio; Safari and Firefox on a desktop cannot share system audio and show an error. Read the laptop guide for that.
If the microphone prompt never shows, you probably tapped Don't Allow once. On an iPhone, open Settings, find your browser, and turn Microphone on; on Android, it is under the browser's site permissions. The help page walks through it screen by screen.
Audio only, and you press Start yourself. No video, no calendar auto-join. The audio is saved with the transcript; replay and speaker names are on Pro and Max, so on Free the transcript does not say who said what.
Tell the room. Recording laws vary by place and some require everyone's consent. MeetingSidekick is for open note-taking, and it asks you to acknowledge that before Start is enabled. Other tools can record in a room too, through their phone apps; here there is no app to install first.
Transcribing from a phone, answered
Can I transcribe a meeting from my phone without installing an app?
Yes. Open meetingsidekick.ai in your phone's browser, tick the consent box, press Start and allow the microphone. The phone records the room, a live transcript appears, and when you press Stop you get a summary with action items and a chat box for the meeting. Nothing to install.
Which phones and browsers work?
Any modern browser on iPhone or Android: Safari, Chrome, Edge or Firefox. The page has to be loaded over https, which meetingsidekick.ai always is. The first time, your browser asks for microphone permission; if you tapped Don't Allow once, re-enable it in your phone's Settings under the browser's microphone permission.
Can my phone capture a Zoom or Teams call I am on?
Only through the microphone. Phone browsers cannot capture the call audio internally, so put the call on speaker and let the phone hear it, or join the call from a laptop and use Chrome or Edge there to share the tab audio. For a meeting in a room, the microphone is all you need.
Do I have to tell people I am recording?
Yes. Recording laws vary by place and some require everyone's consent. MeetingSidekick is for open note-taking, not covert recording, and it asks you to acknowledge that responsibility before Start is enabled. A phone on the table with the transcript visible makes the point on its own.
How much does it cost?
Free is 2 hours of recording a month with no credit card. Pro is $15 a month or $120 a year for 30 hours, speaker names, search across all your meetings and audio replay. Max is $50 a month or $400 a year for unlimited hours plus screenshot chat. A 5-minute trial needs no signup.
Try it on your next meeting. Your phone is already the recorder.
Free to start, no credit card. Open a tab, press Start, set the phone down.
Start free →