Recording a Zoom meeting is straightforward. But getting value from that recording? That's where most people get stuck.

This guide covers the basics of Zoom's built-in recording features, then shows you a better approach if your goal is actually capturing and using what was discussed.

Recording with Zoom's built-in feature

Zoom offers two recording options. Local recording saves the file to your computer. Cloud recording (available on paid plans) saves it to Zoom's servers.

To start a local recording, click the Record button in the meeting toolbar and select "Record on this Computer." When the meeting ends, Zoom converts the recording to an MP4 file and saves it to your Documents folder.

To start a cloud recording, click Record and select "Record to the Cloud." After the meeting, you'll receive an email with a link to access the recording in your Zoom account.

If you don't see the Record button, your account administrator may have disabled recording, or you may need the host to grant you permission.

The problem with video recordings

Recording a meeting is easy. Finding anything useful in that recording later is not.

A one-hour meeting produces a one-hour video file. If you need to find a specific decision or revisit what someone said about a project, you're scrubbing through footage trying to locate it. Most people never do this. The recording sits in a folder, unwatched, taking up storage space.

Video recordings also don't integrate with how you actually work. You can't search them. You can't pull action items out of them automatically. You can't ask a question and get an answer. They're archives, not tools.

A better approach to capturing Zoom meetings

If your goal is to actually use what was discussed in a meeting, you need more than a raw video file. You need the content transformed into something searchable and actionable.

Circleback captures your Zoom meetings and produces structured notes within minutes of the meeting ending. Decisions, action items, and key discussion points are extracted and organized. The full transcript is searchable. And everything feeds into a meeting knowledge base you can query across all your conversations.

You also get a video recording of the meeting, so you still have the full visual record when you need it. The difference is that the video is no longer your only way to access what happened.

How Circleback works with Zoom

Connect your calendar, and Circleback automatically captures your scheduled Zoom meetings. You can choose whether to use a meeting bot or record directly from the desktop app with no bot joining the call. Either way, there's nothing to remember. Meetings are recorded and processed automatically.

Within minutes of the meeting ending, you receive structured notes with a summary, action items with owners, key decisions, and a full searchable transcript. The video recording is available too, synced with the transcript so you can jump to any moment in the conversation.

Over time, your meetings become a searchable knowledge base. Need to find what was discussed about a specific client three months ago? Search for it. Want to see every time a particular topic came up? It's there. You can even ask questions and get answers drawn from actual meeting discussions.

When you still need the video

Video recordings are valuable when you need to capture visual content like screen shares, presentations, or demonstrations. They're also useful for training materials, compliance documentation, or situations where you need a complete visual record. Circleback gives you that video automatically, alongside the structured notes and transcript.

For most day-to-day meetings, though, what you actually need is the information, not the footage. You need to know what was decided, who's responsible for what, and what context was shared. That's what meeting notes capture. That's what you can search. That's what becomes useful later.

Try it yourself

Circleback offers a free trial. Connect it to your next few Zoom meetings and see the difference between a raw video file and meeting intelligence. Sign up at circleback.ai.