How to record a Teams interview without a bot

You can record a Microsoft Teams interview without a bot in two ways: use Teams' own recording and transcription, which shows a notification to everyone and saves to the organizer's OneDrive, or capture the audio on your own computer with a desktop app, which adds nothing to the meeting. Third-party note-taker bots are the option that changed most: Teams now detects external bots and holds them in the lobby by default.

Below is how each option behaves, what the candidate sees, where the recording goes, the admin settings that matter, and how Zoom and Google Meet compare. Microsoft behaviour is cited from Microsoft Learn and Microsoft Support as of September 2026.

Your three options at a glance

Option 1: Teams' built-in recording and transcription

How to start it

According to Microsoft Support:

1. Join the meeting.
2. In the meeting controls, select More actions > Record and transcribe > Start recording, then Confirm.
3. For a transcript without a video recording, choose Start transcription from the same menu instead. Recording and transcription are separate controls.
4. To stop, go back to Record and transcribe and select Stop recording.

Only some people can do this. Microsoft lists the organizer and people from the organizer's organization as able to start a recording; guests, people from another organization and anonymous attendees cannot. The person recording also needs a Teams license and a meeting policy that allows it (Microsoft Learn).

What the candidate sees

All participants get a notification in the Teams desktop, web or mobile app as soon as recording starts, and a notification when a meeting is being transcribed (Microsoft Support). Admins can customize that notification. The notice is visible, which helps, but it is not the same as asking the candidate, so say something first (see the consent section below).

Where the recording goes and who can see it

From Microsoft Learn's storage and permissions page:

• A scheduled meeting recording saves to the organizer's OneDrive, in a Recordings folder, even if the organizer did not attend. Channel meetings save to the channel's SharePoint site.
• Other people from the organizer's organization who were in the meeting get read access automatically. On an interview panel, that means every internal interviewer.
• External participants, such as the candidate, have no access unless the organizer shares it.
• Microsoft gives a one-hour recording as about 400 MB, which counts against OneDrive storage.

Microsoft's recording policy page also notes that recordings appear in Microsoft 365 file lists such as Shared with me and Recent, and are indexed by Microsoft 365 Search. For candidate interviews, decide who should be the organizer, and whether the whole panel should get access by default.

How long it is kept

Meeting recordings and transcripts expire after 120 days by default and move to the recycle bin. Admins can change the default, but the change only applies to new recordings (Microsoft Learn). Check this against your own record retention schedule: 120 days may be longer than you want to keep interview video, or shorter than your legal team requires.

AI notes on top

Teams' intelligent recap adds AI notes, tasks and chapters after the meeting. It requires a Teams Premium license or one of Microsoft's AI add-on licenses, and transcription must be turned on (Microsoft Learn). It summarizes the meeting; it does not score the candidate against your competencies.

Option 2: capture the audio on your own computer

A desktop app records what your computer plays (the candidate's voice) and what your microphone hears (yours), then transcribes it. Nothing is added to the Teams meeting, Teams shows no recording notification, and it works the same whether you organize the meeting or join someone else's.

What to get right:

• Use the Teams desktop app or the browser consistently and test the one you use; audio routing can differ.
• Wear headphones. Without them, the candidate's voice comes out of your speakers and back into the microphone, which hurts transcription and speaker labels.
• Grant permissions in advance. On macOS, the app needs microphone and system audio or screen recording permission. Do it before the first interview.
• Check your company's policy. Some organizations restrict which apps can be installed or which apps may capture meeting audio. Ask IT once rather than discovering it mid-search.
• Announce it yourself. This is the main trade-off. No banner means the notice is entirely your job.

Interview Signal works this way: it captures audio on your computer for Teams, Zoom, Meet and phone screens, keeps transcripts and notes on your machine, and includes a read-aloud consent line and one-click pause. General note-takers offer desktop modes too; check that the vendor names Teams among supported apps, or test it.

Option 3: third-party bots, and why candidates notice

A bot joins the meeting as a participant, usually through the meeting link in your calendar. The candidate sees its name in the participant list, often a vendor name rather than yours.

Teams now treats these differently from people. Microsoft's external bots documentation says Teams detects external bots when they join and places them in the lobby regardless of the meeting's lobby settings, where an organizer has to admit them explicitly and is reminded of the risk. The admin setting "Manage external bots and their access to meetings" defaults to requiring approval when a bot is detected; an admin can switch detection off. Microsoft also notes that some bots may not be detected and some humans may be misclassified.

In an interview, that creates three practical problems:

• If you are not the organizer, your bot waits in a lobby only the organizer can clear.
• The candidate may see the bot flagged, admitted, or waiting, and ask what it is.
• When a client or partner company hosts, their admin policy decides, not yours.

Consent on a Teams interview

A Teams notification tells people a recording is happening. Whether that is enough notice or consent where you and the candidate are depends on the law that applies, and some states require every party to agree. Our guides on whether you can record an interview and all-party consent states go into detail.

Teams has a stricter option. With the admin policy Require participant agreement for recording and transcription turned on (it is off by default), everyone except the person who started recording is muted with cameras off until they agree; anyone who answers No gets a view-only experience, and the choice appears in the attendance report (Microsoft Learn). If your company uses it, warn candidates in the invite, or the sudden mute will throw the first minute.

Whatever method you use, say this before you start:

Before we begin, I'd like to record [or: transcribe] this interview so I can
focus on our conversation and share accurate notes with the hiring team.
The recording is only used for this hiring process. Is that OK with you?
If not, that's completely fine and won't affect your application.

If they say no, stop capture before continuing. Our consent script has short and strict versions, and the consent guide has notice text by state.

What to ask IT for

Recruiting's needs are narrower than the company's. Copy this into a ticket; the setting names are from Microsoft Learn, so your admin will recognize them.

Subject: Teams meeting policy for the recruiting team

Please assign the recruiting team (group: [name]) a meeting policy with:

1. Meeting recording: On
   (PowerShell: Set-CsTeamsMeetingPolicy -AllowCloudRecording $true)
2. Transcription: On
3. Recordings and transcriptions automatically expire: On,
   default expiration [N] days to match our interview retention schedule
   (PowerShell: -NewMeetingRecordingExpirationDays [N])
4. Require participant agreement for recording and transcription: [On/Off]
   (PowerShell: -ExplicitRecordingConsent Enabled)
5. Manage external bots and their access to meetings: leave the default,
   "When detected, require approval before joining"

Also: confirm whether the recruiting team may install a desktop
note-taking app, and which ones are approved.

Teams, Zoom and Google Meet compared

Built-in options only, as documented by each vendor as of September 2026.

Sources: Zoom support on computer recording, audio transcription, recording consent and Meeting Summary; Google Meet Help on recording, transcripts and Take notes for me.

A checklist before a recorded Teams interview

• You know who the organizer is, and that their policy allows recording, or you are using desktop capture.
• The invite says the interview may be recorded or transcribed, and why.
• If participant agreement is required, the invite warns the candidate they will be asked to agree.
• You have decided who on the panel should have access to the recording, before it is created.
• The expiry setting matches how long you keep interview records.
• For desktop capture: headphones on, permissions granted, a two-minute test call done this week.
• No bot is on the invite that the organizer is not expecting to admit.
• You have the consent line ready and know how to stop or pause within a second.
• After the call, notes go into your scorecard the same day, and the recording is deleted when it is no longer needed.