Works with Signal
Listen records Signal calls from your Mac and transcribes them on the same machine. Nothing joins the call and nothing is uploaded, which is the only way a Signal call should ever be written down.
This looks like an Intel Mac, and Listen will not run on it.
Listen transcribes on your own machine, and that needs the Neural Engine Apple introduced with the M1 in late 2020. There is no Intel version, and there is no version that would work.
Open the Apple menu and choose About This Mac. If it says Chip rather than Processor, this guess is wrong and you can download Listen as normal.
How it works
The menu bar is still there for a call it did not catch, or one you want running before anybody has joined. Either way your microphone goes to one track and everything Signal plays goes to another, which is what lets Listen tell the voices apart afterwards.
Why this one is different
Meeting notetakers work by being invited into a call as a participant. A Signal call has no invitation to send, which is why most notetakers simply do not cover it. Listen never needed one: it records what your Mac is already playing, so the call is an ordinary sound on your machine and nothing has to let it in.
Anybody choosing Signal has already decided who they are willing to trust with a conversation. Sending that same call to a transcription service would undo the decision entirely. Listen is the only shape that fits: the recording, the transcript and the speaker names are all made on your own Mac, and there is no server anywhere holding any of it.
After the call
Give the call your attention, not your notepad. Listen writes it up on your Mac's own chip, works out who spoke, and remembers the voices, so the regulars name themselves after the first time.
Privacy
There is no Listen server, because there are no servers. The recording, the transcript and the names on it are all made on your own computer. No account, and nothing reports back beyond anonymous usage statistics, on by default and turned off in Settings whenever you like.
Listen ships a machine-readable list of every connection it is allowed to make, inside the app itself, so none of that has to be taken on trust. What runs where sets out every connection it can make and how to check each one yourself, and there are answers ready for a privacy or HIPAA review.
Questions
Yes. Listen records your microphone and the audio your Mac is playing, so a Signal Desktop call is captured like any other sound on the machine.
No. Transcription runs on your Mac's own chip. The audio and the transcript stay in a folder on your disk, and Listen has no server to send them to.
It does not touch it. The call is still end to end encrypted in transit. Listen records your end of it after it has been decrypted for you to hear, which is the same thing your speakers do.
No, and that is the reason to tell them yourself. A Signal user in particular has chosen the app for a reason, so recording without saying so is a poor way to treat them.
The app carries a machine-readable list of every connection it may make, so the claim on this page can be checked with a firewall rather than taken on faith.
Get Listen
Free to download, and free to record for as long as you like. Apple silicon, macOS 14 or later. The speech model is about 2.5 GB and downloads once, the first time you run it.
Also works with
Listen is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to Signal or its owner. Signal is named here only to describe what Listen records.
