How to record video calls on Zoom, Skype, Google Meet, Hangouts, or with your computer

Don’t want to miss anything about your video call? Here is how to record video calls with Zoom, Skype, Google Meet, Hangouts, and with your own computer.

Table of Contents

1. Why it is inevitable to record your calls and meetings
2. How to record a Zoom call
3. How to record video calls on Skype
4. How to record Google Meet or Hangouts video calls
5. How to make a video recording from my computer
6. How to transcribe your calls with Amberscript

Why it is inevitable to record your calls and meetings

Working from home, flexible working hours, or remote work are trends that  Since it is simple to get an internet connection almost everywhere in the world, costly business travels are unnecessary. Empoloyees can work across borders with little to no effort, flexible work schedules are possible, and people may therefore easily juggle work and other responsibilities, such as family life.

While working from home may seem perfect, it may be difficult to coordinate communication across teams and throughout the entire organization. Online conferences and meetings are possible, but how does one spread information or training content to those that cannot be present in a video call at a particular time?

At Amberscript, we offer transcription and subtitling services by combining artificial and human intelligence. Our AI engine can create automatically generated transcripts from your meetings and calls that will help individuals save time and effort while still keeping a record of the most important information. Thus, to generate transcripts, you will first need to record your calls. Here are four guides on how to record your business meetings.

1. How to record a Zoom call

Recording calls is a feature available to all users on Zoom. Free users have access to local recording, meaning that the audio or video file could be saved locally to their computer, while paid users have the option to store it in the cloud.

1. Open a Zoom meeting
2. Click on “Record” on the lower bar
3. The recorded files can then be uploaded to Google Drive, your dropbox or uploaded to streaming platforms like Vimeo or Youtube.

Go to Zoom for more detailed instructions and features.

2. How to record video calls on Skype

The recording function is only available for Skype to Skype calls (not when using skype to call a land phone number). One of the nice features of Skype is that the other speaker(s) receives a request for permission, so there is no need to verbally ask for consent. These are the steps to take to record and save your Skype call:

1. Open a Skype Call

2. If you are on a desktop, click on Start Recording, for mobile users, you can tap on the Start Recording icon.

3. All people in the call will receive a pop-up announcing that the call is going to be recorded.

The recorded file will be kept in your chat for 30 days. If you want to keep it longer than that, you can download it and save it on your computer.

4. Files from Skype will be saved in an MP4 format.

Check out Skype information about recording (video) calls.

3. How to record Google Meet or Hangouts video calls

Google Meet, Hangouts, or Chat?

Google has introduced some significant changes for users: Google Hangouts users will be eventually migrated to the new Google Chat platform. Right now only a few types of G Suite domains can record a Hangouts Meet. This is only available for Enterprise and Enterprise for Education. Classic Hangouts/video calls via classic Hangouts do not have a recording feature.

Can you record a Google Meet video call?

Yes, if you are using one of the Google Workspace editions mentioned in the official Google support article. But that’s not all – additional settings must be met, in order to be able to record a meeting with Google Meet. To record a meeting you need to make sure that a Google Workspace administrator has enabled the recording feature for your account. If it’s enabled you can record only if:

• You’re the meeting organizer
• You’re in the same organization as the organizer

Last but not least: Recording is only available from Meet on a computer. Mobile app users are notified when the recording starts or stops, but can’t control recording.

How to record a Google Meet call?

1. Start or Join a meeting.
2. At the bottom right of your screen, click Activities icon   Recording. 
3. Click Start recording button. 
4. In the window that appears, click Start.
5. Wait for the recording to start. Other participants will be notified when the recording starts or stops.
6. When you finish,  click again on Activities   Recording  Stop Recording.
7. In the window that appears, click Stop recording.

For more information about recording a video meeting please visit Google Meet Help.

If you do not have a G-Suite business account, you can still record the video calls by using a screen recording software.

4. How to make a video recording from my computer

1. Choose a method to record

• Option 1: use the media player on your computer

Whether you have Windows or Mac, you will need some type of software to record video and audio on your screen. The easiest way of recording your screen is using a media player, such as Quicktime Player (which is often already installed on Mac) or VLC Player. In both players, if you select “File” you will have the option to either “Start New Video Recording”, “Start New Screen Recording” or “Start New Audio Recording”. Select this option to start recording your entire screen, a part of your screen or simply the audio.

• Option 2: use a screen recording software

You can also visit the Google Playstore or iOS App Store to look for other screen-recording software. Generally, some recommended apps include Screen Record, Screen Capture or Screen Recorder Robot. These apps have additional features but have not yet proven to work better/worse than media players if all you want to do is record video or audio.

For Mac

For Windows

2. Record your video/audio

Depending on what you want to record, you need to select the right option. Once you have selected the option, a small window with control buttons will open. You can use this to start, pause and stop the recording.

3. Save and export your recording

Once you are done recording, you can hit the stop button in the controls window. Then press Control + s (command + s for Mac users), to save your recording and export it as an MP3 or MP4 file.

4. Keeping important bites of information

Did you learn how to record video calls? If you would like to have a written version of them, you can use a platform like Amberscript to transcribe, edit and save the most important information from the meeting in-text format. Text files are easier to keep than video and audio and information can be consolidated before shared.

You can use Amberscript to transcribe your video or audio file, the first 10 minutes are free!

How to transcribe your calls with Amberscript

Amberscript is a reliable AI-based transcription service and tool that creates subtitle files using the audio transcription. It also possesses the automatic subtitle generator that helps it get the best subtitle files you want in the quickest time possible. So here is how you get your SRT files using Amberscript.

1. Upload your files to the Amberscript platform
2. Choose your service: we offer machine-made and human-made transcription services
3. In case you chose our machine-made service, let our AI generate your transcript in minutes
4. Export your files in Word, JSON, Text, and many other formats.