How to Transcribe a Teams Meeting Recording

To transcribe a Microsoft Teams meeting, record the meeting, download the recording or copy its shareable link, upload it to the audio-to-text tool, and export the text as TXT, SRT, VTT, or another format.

A Teams recording is usually saved as an MP4 video file, but you do not have to sit through the whole meeting again. Turn the audio into a searchable transcript, keep the speaker labels for each turn, and use the text for notes, action items, or captions. This guide walks through locating the recording, getting it into the tool, and cleaning up the result.

What you need before you start

First, confirm the meeting was actually recorded. If you organized it, you would have started the recording from the Teams controls. If you only attended, ask the organizer for the recording link or file.

Teams saves recordings to OneDrive for private meetings and to SharePoint for channel meetings. You can find the recording in the meeting chat once it has finished processing, or in the organizer's OneDrive or the channel's SharePoint files.

You also need one of the following:

• A downloaded copy of the recording, usually an MP4 file.
• A shareable link to the recording in OneDrive or SharePoint.
• An audio-only file, if you already converted the recording elsewhere.

Both the file upload and the URL paste lead to the same transcript, so pick whichever is easier for you.

Step-by-step: transcribe a Teams meeting recording

1. Open the meeting chat or recording location. In Teams, go to the meeting chat or the calendar event. If the recording is ready, you will see a link or thumbnail there. If not, open the organizer's OneDrive or the channel's SharePoint files and look in the Recordings folder.

2. Download the file or copy a share link. To upload a file, download the MP4 to your computer or phone. To use a URL instead, open the recording in OneDrive or SharePoint, select Share, and copy the link. If the link is locked behind sign-in and you do not want to deal with permissions, download the file instead. If you prefer working from links, you can paste the URL into the URL-to-text tool.

3. Open the audio-to-text tool. Go to the audio-to-text tool and drag the recording into the upload area, or paste your share link into the URL field. The tool handles many languages, so there is no need to convert the meeting language first.

4. Let the tool process the audio. CATT transcribes the speech, detects separate speakers, and adds speaker labels. It also prepares an AI summary and action items from the meeting content. This step is automatic, though longer recordings take longer to process.

5. Review the transcript. Read through the text while the meeting is still fresh and fix any names, acronyms, or product terms the tool misheard. Use the speaker labels to check who said what, and correct any turns that were assigned to the wrong person, especially where people talked over each other.

6. Export the transcript. Pick TXT for plain text notes, SRT or VTT for captions and subtitles, or another format from the export list. For meeting notes, TXT is the easiest starting point.

7. Turn the transcript into minutes or action items. For a polished recap, use the transcript as your source. The guide on create meeting minutes from audio covers turning a raw transcript into a clean minutes document, and extract action items from meetings shows how to pull out owners and deadlines.

Which option should you use?

The entry point is the only thing that changes. Everything after the upload or paste works the same way.

Tips for a cleaner transcript

• Ask participants to use headphones or a decent microphone and mute when not speaking. Most transcript errors trace back to audio quality, and background noise is the usual culprit.
• Avoid talking over each other. Crosstalk is the main cause of jumbled speaker labels and merged sentences.
• Keep a list of names, acronyms, and product terms. A short list prepared before the meeting makes the review step fast, because you know exactly what to search for.
• Review while the meeting is fresh. You will remember who said what, which makes speaker label corrections quick.
• Split very long recordings if processing stalls. A lengthy meeting can be divided into shorter chunks, transcribed one after the other, and combined in your notes.
• Keep the original recording until the transcript is saved somewhere safe. Re-running a section is much easier when you still have the source file.

If something goes wrong

The recording is not in the chat yet. Processing takes a while after a long meeting. Check the Recordings folder in OneDrive or SharePoint a bit later rather than assuming the recording failed.

The share link will not load. The link is probably restricted. Open it yourself in a private browser window to check the permissions, or download the file and upload it instead.

Words are wrong in places. Fix names, acronyms, and technical terms by hand. Accents, crosstalk, and poor audio cause most of these mistakes, and a quick pass with the recording open in another tab is usually enough.

Speaker labels look shuffled. Correct them during your review pass. If two people spoke at once, the tool can only make its best guess, so a short manual fix is normal.

Wrapping up

Once you have done this once, it becomes a repeatable routine: record, grab the file or link, upload it to the audio-to-text tool, review the speaker labels, and export. The transcript then feeds whatever you need next, whether that is minutes, action items, captions, or a searchable record of the discussion.