Can you transcribe a Microsoft Teams meeting without recording it?

Yes. Teams treats transcription and recording as two things, and you can have the first without the second. This answer is for anyone who wants the text of a Microsoft Teams meeting without keeping a video, or who has been told "we don't record these calls". It branches from how to get a transcript of a Teams meeting. The details come from Microsoft's page on live transcription in Teams meetings as of October 2026.

How do you start transcription without recording?

From the meeting controls, on Teams for desktop:

1. Select More actions.
2. Select Transcribe.
3. Confirm the language everyone is speaking.
4. Select Confirm.

Everyone in the meeting is told it is being transcribed. Microsoft's mobile steps let you start it from the Teams app too, but the live transcript can be read only on Teams for desktop; the mobile app shows it after the meeting.

The language you confirm matters. Teams transcribes in it, so if a meeting is held in German or Hindi with English confirmed, the transcript is wrong until someone changes the language. Microsoft says Teams detects the mismatch and prompts the organiser, a co-organiser or whoever started the transcript to update the spoken language.

What does recording do to transcription?

It starts it. Microsoft says that when you record a meeting, transcription starts automatically. So "record but don't transcribe" is not the default, while "transcribe but don't record" is a choice you make by starting transcription alone.

You start	You get
Transcription only	A transcript, no video
A recording	A recording, and transcription starts with it
Neither	Live captions if people turn them on, nothing kept

Captions are not a substitute. Microsoft's caption help says Teams doesn't save captions after the meeting.

Who can start transcription in Teams?

Someone the organiser's policy allows. Microsoft's admin documentation describes transcription as both a per-organiser and a per-user policy setting, so the organiser must have it turned on, and so must the person starting it. People from another organisation and anonymous participants cannot start it. If you are a guest, ask the organiser to start it at the beginning of the call.

Where does the transcript go?

To the meeting's Recap, under Transcript, and into the organiser's OneDrive. Organisers and co-organisers can download it as .docx or .vtt; see how to download a Teams meeting transcript. A participant from another organisation can read it live, but not after the meeting.

How is a notetaker different?

A notetaker does not start Teams' Transcribe feature, so nothing goes to the Recap or the organiser's OneDrive. The TrackHeros notetaker joins the call from its Teams link as a visible participant; if the meeting has a lobby, it waits there until someone admits it. It records the call and reads the live captions for the speakers' names, and when the meeting needs it, an audio pass over its own recording produces the transcript. The transcript is always in English, whichever of close to 100 languages the meeting was held in. So the question it raises is not "record or transcribe" but "may a notetaker attend": the meeting's lobby settings, and whoever may admit people, decide whether it gets in, and everyone should know it is there. The recording plays back inside TrackHeros, filed under the client. More on the Microsoft Teams notetaker page, and on how it handles languages in language detection on Microsoft Teams.