If you regularly attend business meetings or online lectures on Microsoft Teams, then you'll understand how challenging it can be to keep on top of note-taking while also staying focused and paying attention to the subject at hand.

That's where Teams meeting transcriptions come in handy. Take the stress out of note-taking and minute-taking by letting someone else (or better yet, your computer) do it for you! By delegating this responsibility, you can stay focused in important meetings, lectures and seminars, and you'll receive searchable, shareable notes just minutes after the call has ended.

In this guide we'll talk you through the advantages and disadvantages of using MS Teams live transcription service vs transcribing a recording of your Teams meeting using a specialist transcription service like Transcribe, with step-by-step instructions on how to transcribe a Teams meeting, no matter which option you pick.

Jump to:

• Live transcription vs transcribing a recording of your Teams meeting

• How to get a live transcription

• How to record and transcribe a Teams meeting

Teams has a free built-in live-transcription feature which can be useful for improving accessibility during the meeting itself, make your meeting more inclusive in real time for participants who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, or who might find it easier to understand the language used when it's written down. It can also benefit participants in noisy places who might struggle to hear the audio.

However, if your organization is using OneDrive for Business and SharePoint for meeting recordings, then your IT administrator has to enable the live transcription feature for you to be able to use it. Additionally, only the meeting organizer and presenters can start the transcription, and if it isn't started at the beginning of the meeting, then you can't get a transcript retrospectively. For these reasons, this isn't necessarily the best option when you want a transcription to read through and use after the meeting

Having a video transcription post-meeting is useful for creating summaries and for referring back to once the meeting has ended. Many users complain about how quickly transcriptions direct from Microsoft Teams are available after the meeting has ended, but there are quicker alternatives. With a professional, paid-for transcription service like Transcribe, you'll get accurate transcripts just minutes after the meeting has drawn to a close. All you need to do is record the meeting then leave the rest up to us.

Meeting recordings on Teams also have to be started by the meeting organizer or presenters, however once the call ends, the recording is available to all attendees. Once you've downloaded the recording, simply upload it to Transcribe. Once you've received the transcription, you can use our app or online editor to skim the document, search for key points in the meeting and create summaries that you can refer back to or share with your colleagues, classmates or clients. Export the notes in your chosen format - or get a shareable link for online collaboration.

1. Start the transcription

Click the 3-dot icon at the top of the Teams window (...) and then click "Start transcription". Remember that only the meeting organizer or presenters can do this.

2. Choose the language

You'll see the live transcription on the right hand side of your screen. At the top right of the transcript window, click the 3 dots, then click "Change spoken language".

3. Hide or show

You can select whether you want the live transcription hidden or shown by clicking the 3 dots at the top of the screen and then selecting "Hide transcript" or "Show transcript".

4. Stop transcription

When you're ready to stop transcribing, click the 3 dots and then click "Stop transcription" or "Stop recording" (if a recording is in progress). The transcription will also stop automatically once all participants have left the meeting.

5. Download your transcription

When the meeting is over, go to your Teams calendar, open the meeting event, select the transcript and download it as a .docx or .vtt file.

1. Start recording your meeting

Click the 3-dot icon at the top of the Teams window (...) and then click "Start recording". When the meeting has finished, go to the same place and click "Stop recording".

2. Download the recording

If you're meeting in a channel, the recording shows up in the meeting chat or channel conversation for you to download. Otherwise it is saved in SharePoint or OneDrive.

3. Upload your recording to Transcribe

Import the recording, select the language of the recording and start the transcription process. Your transcription will be ready in a matter of minutes thanks to our high-speed AI software, so sit back and relax, and we'll send you a notification when your transcription is complete.

4. Your transcription is ready!

Now that your Teams transcription is ready, you can skim-read, search for key points and edit it in the app, online or in your preferred file format. With our PRO service you can export to TXT, PDF, DOCX, JPG and SRT.

Use the transcript to create a meeting summary, revision notes, subtitles, training material, reports, articles - whatever your business or academic objectives!

Ready to transcribe your Teams meetings? Download the Transcribe app or launch the online editor to get started.

Written By Katie Garrett