Works with Slack huddles
Listen records Slack huddles from your Mac and writes them down locally. Nothing joins, nothing is scheduled, and nothing is uploaded.
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 Slack huddles plays goes to another, which is what lets Listen tell the voices apart afterwards.
Why this one is different
A Slack huddles call tends to start because somebody had a question, not because it was in a calendar a week ago. Notetakers that work from your calendar never see those, so the conversations that actually decide things are the ones that go unrecorded. Listen starts from the menu bar, in the second you need it.
A huddle is the least ceremonious call there is and often the most consequential: two people, no invite, five minutes, a decision. Nothing that works from your calendar will ever see one. Listen starts from the menu bar while the huddle is still going.
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 Slack is playing, so a huddle is captured like any other call on the machine.
Yes, and you will get everything from the moment you press it. Recording starts on the press rather than on a confirmation, so you do not lose the first minute deciding.
No. Nothing joins and nobody is added.
Yes. Everyone else is on one track and Listen separates the voices on it.
No, only the audio and what was said over it.
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 Slack huddles or its owner. Slack huddles is named here only to describe what Listen records.
