Your meetings, as Markdown in your own folder.
Records both sides of the call, transcribes it live, writes the note into your Obsidian vault. No bot joins. No Convene server.
What is Convene?
Convene records your meetings on macOS and iPhone and writes the notes into a folder you own. Your microphone and your Mac's system audio run as two separate streams, transcribed live on your own AssemblyAI key. Each meeting lands as a Markdown file with frontmatter, a summary, key moments, and a timestamped transcript. No bot joins.
Free, MIT licensed. Requires macOS 15 or later.
How it works
How does a meeting become a note?
From calendar to vault, without a detour.
Before
Your day, one click away
Every calendar you already have in Calendar.app, in the menu bar. Click an event to open the call and start recording.
During
Both sides, transcribed live
Your mic and your Mac's system audio run as two separate streams, so your side and theirs are never guessed at. Hit ⌥⇧K to flag a moment.
A timestamped live transcript separates microphone and system-audio speakers, with a key moment flagged at 38 seconds. After
A Markdown file, straight away
Stop, and the file is on disk. The summary rewrites the note in place a moment later, built from the transcript: the line you spoke at 00:44 becomes the action item and links back to that second.
A transcript line at 00:44 becomes a linked action item in the saved Markdown note beside it.
Where your data goes
Where does my audio actually go?
No badges. Just the actual route.
Capture, the crash log and the finished note stay on your Mac. Transcription does not: audio streams to AssemblyAI over your own key, and if you turn on summaries the transcript goes to Anthropic or OpenAI over your own key. You pay those providers directly, and there is no Convene server in between, so we never receive your audio, transcript or notes: there is nowhere for them to arrive. If you need transcription that never leaves the machine, Convene is not the right tool. Read the code.
Setup
What do I need to set up?
Two minutes, once. All Convene needs is a transcription key.
Grant three permissions
Microphone, Calendar, and the screen permission macOS uses for system audio. Audio only, no video. Notifications are optional, and only used to offer recording when a meeting app opens.
Paste an AssemblyAI key
Runs on your own AssemblyAI key, so you pay them directly. Paste it once. It goes into your Keychain.
Choose your notes folder
If you use Obsidian, pick the vault. The notes show up in it.
- Summaries are optional. Without an Anthropic or OpenAI key you still get the transcript, your key moments, and the note in your folder.
On your iPhone
Does Convene work on iPhone?
For the meetings in a room. iOS will not let an app capture another app's audio, so the phone records the room and splits the speakers afterwards. Same vault as your Mac.
iOS 17 or later · Open the link on your iPhone
Questions
What do people ask before installing?
Answers, not hedges. Including the awkward ones.
Will my Claude or ChatGPT subscription work for summaries?
- No. A Claude Pro or ChatGPT Plus subscription covers the chat apps, not API access, which is billed separately. You need a key from console.anthropic.com or platform.openai.com. This catches almost everyone.
Do I need to tell people I am recording?
- Convene does not announce itself, so nobody is told for you. Recording-consent law varies by country and by state, and some of it applies to you rather than the software. Say that you are recording.
Ready to take the notes and keep the files?
Take the notes. Keep the files. Free, MIT licensed, no account. The next meeting can write itself down.
Download for macOSv0.2.0 · macOS 15 or later · 3.0 MB