Potok turns speech into text in 33 languages, including English and Russian.
Teams transcribes a recording itself: the Recording and transcription panel has Russian as a recognition language, but you need a Microsoft 365 license and administrator permission. Without it, for guests, or if you need a file and a summary, send the recording to the Potok Telegram bot @potok_now_bot or the bot's mini app: the text comes to the chat or as a file, 60 minutes per month free.
A Microsoft Teams meeting recording can be transcribed right in Teams itself, if the license and administrator rights allow it. When there is no transcript of its own, or you need a file with a summary and tasks by speaker, the video is sent to another tool.
Where to find the recording after a Teams meeting
A Teams meeting recording is stored not in the chat but in the Microsoft 365 cloud.
- The meeting organizer or co-organizer can start and stop the recording; guests and participants from other organizations do not have access to it.
- The finished video is saved in the organizer's OneDrive for work or school; a recording of a meeting in a channel goes to SharePoint.
- A link to the recording appears in the meeting chat, and the file format is MP4.
For the recording button to work at all, you need a work or school Microsoft 365 account with a suitable license (Office 365 E1, E3, E5, Business and others) and recording turned on by the administrator.
How to transcribe a Microsoft Teams meeting recording to text
Without such a license, for a meeting with outside participants, or when you need the whole file, a summary and lines split by speaker, the recording is sent to the Potok bot.
- Download the recorded video from OneDrive or SharePoint, or open the link from the meeting chat.
- In Telegram, start the bot @potok_now_bot with the Start command (/start).
- Forward the file to the bot directly.
- The bot sends the result: a short recording as a chat message, a long one as a separate file. The buttons Summary, Tasks and deadlines, Ask and Other format appear next to it, and timecodes with speaker labeling ("Speaker 1", "Speaker 2") are turned on in advance in the bot's settings (/settings).
If the meeting video is too large for Telegram, the same file is uploaded to the bot's mini app: the limit is 2 GB, you can sign in by email or through Telegram, and the recordings are synced with the bot.
Teams' own transcriber: when it works
With a work or school Microsoft 365 license and recording turned on by the administrator, its own transcript opens in the meeting panel Recording and transcription, then Start transcription, where you need to choose the language of speech. Russian is among the recognition languages. Live translation of the transcript into another language during the meeting is a separate feature, and it works only with a Teams Premium license. Without a suitable license or administrator rights, this panel may be missing altogether, and then the bot or the Potok web version will do. A broader overview of tools for turning a recording into text is in the comparison of audio-to-text transcription services.
| Service | Platforms | Free | Price | Payment from Russia | Where speech is recognized |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Potok bot and web version | Telegram (@potok_now_bot, mini app inside the bot) | 60 minutes per month | 7 days: 249 ₽, 30 days: 449 ₽, one year: 2 890 ₽; included in the Potok app subscription | Russian bank cards, rubles | cloud, servers in Russia; internet required |
| Tactiq | Chrome extension | 10 meeting transcriptions per month | $12/mo (Pro, monthly) | not disclosed | not disclosed |
| Transkriptor | Web | 10 minutes on sign-up, limited to 2 min/day (according to the localized Russian site transkriptor.ru); the international site transkriptor.com states a free trial (up to 90 minutes according to secondary sources; the official pricing page could not be opened directly because it timed out) | 490 ₽/one-time (Start, 150 minutes (transkriptor.ru)); 790 ₽/one-time (Pro, 700 minutes (transkriptor.ru)); 1900 ₽/one-time (Premium, 2100 minutes (transkriptor.ru)) | yes, on the localized site transkriptor.ru: Visa/Mastercard/Mir bank cards with no fee, SBP via QR code with no fee, YooMoney with a 3% fee; payments are one-off (no subscription) and processed by the KASSA service. The international site transkriptor.com presumably bills in dollars; this is not confirmed directly (the pricing page timed out) | not disclosed |
| SaluteSpeech Bot (Sber) | Telegram | free; voice messages, audio and video notes | — | not disclosed | SaluteSpeech cloud (Sber) |
| Video summary in Yandex Browser | Yandex Browser | free | — | not disclosed | Yandex cloud |
| Voix (@RecogMyAudioBot) | Telegram | voice messages up to 15 minutes, video up to 6 minutes | — | not disclosed | not disclosed |
| Fireflies.ai | Web, iOS, Android, Chrome extension | limited storage and AI credits | — | not disclosed | not disclosed |
| Audio2Text | Web, Telegram | 15 minutes per month | 295 ₽/mo (Basic, 500 minutes); 495 ₽/mo (Standard, 1000 minutes); 1245 ₽/mo (Expert, 5000 minutes) | rubles | not disclosed |
| Happy Scribe | Web | 10 minutes of AI transcription | $17/mo (Basic, monthly, 120 minutes); $29/mo (Pro, monthly, 600 minutes) | not disclosed | not disclosed |
| Notta | Web, Windows, macOS, iOS, Android | 120 minutes per month, up to 3 minutes per recording | $13.99/mo (Pro, monthly, 1800 minutes); $27.99/mo (Business, monthly) | not disclosed | not disclosed |
| TurboScribe | Web | 3 files a day, each up to 30 minutes | $20/mo (Unlimited, monthly) | not disclosed | not disclosed |
| Service | Free | Paid |
|---|---|---|
| Potok bot and web version | 60 minutes per month | 7 days: 249 ₽, 30 days: 449 ₽, one year: 2 890 ₽; included in the Potok app subscription |
| Tactiq | 10 meeting transcriptions per month | $12/mo (Pro, monthly) |
| Transkriptor | 10 minutes on sign-up, limited to 2 min/day (according to the localized Russian site transkriptor.ru); the international site transkriptor.com states a free trial (up to 90 minutes according to secondary sources; the official pricing page could not be opened directly because it timed out) | 490 ₽/one-time (Start, 150 minutes (transkriptor.ru)); 790 ₽/one-time (Pro, 700 minutes (transkriptor.ru)); 1900 ₽/one-time (Premium, 2100 minutes (transkriptor.ru)) |
| SaluteSpeech Bot (Sber) | free; voice messages, audio and video notes | — |
| Video summary in Yandex Browser | free | — |
| Voix (@RecogMyAudioBot) | voice messages up to 15 minutes, video up to 6 minutes | — |
| Fireflies.ai | limited storage and AI credits | — |
| Task | Characters | Typing (200 chars/min) | Voice (900 chars/min) |
|---|---|---|---|
| chat reply | 300 | 2 min | 0.5 min |
| 1500 | 8 min | 1.7 min | |
| post or meeting minutes | 4000 | 20 min | 4.4 min |
| article | 10000 | 50 min | 11.1 min |
When a Teams recording needs the bot
Note that the Potok bot is a cloud service, processing runs on servers in Russia, and without a network it simply will not start. If the conversation was not in Russian or you need a ready translation into another language, the bot cannot do this. There will be no real names of speakers in the text, only the labels "Speaker 1", "Speaker 2" and so on. And one more thing: the text appears only after the recording has been fully processed, and during the call itself the bot transcribes nothing. You can compare with similar meeting transcription services in the review of Otter.ai for Russian (in Russian).
Frequently asked questions
No, ordinary transcription is included in a work or school Microsoft 365 license with recording turned on by the administrator. A separate Teams Premium license is needed only for live translation of the transcript into another language during the meeting.
Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text. Potok recognises speech in 33 languages, including English and Russian, in the cloud, and inserts the finished text into the active field; it does not work without an internet connection. Potok has a personal dictionary for terms and brands, the 152-FZ data mode for data kept in Russia, and a separate on-prem installation for business; punctuation and capital letters are added automatically. Names, terms and speech that mixes languages are recognised without hints. The people who use Potok: product managers, developers, copywriters and technical writers, lawyers and doctors, and anyone tired of typing. For Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text. Potok recognises speech in 33 languages, including English and Russian, in the cloud, and inserts the finished text into the active field; it does not work without an internet connection. Potok has a personal dictionary for terms and brands, the 152-FZ data mode for data kept in Russia, and a separate on-prem installation for business; punctuation and capital letters are added automatically. Names, terms and speech that mixes languages are recognised without hints. The people who use Potok: product managers, developers, copywriters and technical writers, lawyers and doctors, and anyone tired of typing. For Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text. Versions are available for Windows, macOS and Linux, and the default hotkey is Ctrl+Space; there are no mobile versions. Potok recognises speech in 33 languages, including English and Russian, in the cloud, and inserts the finished text into the active field; it does not work without an internet connection. The hotkey can be changed in the settings: any key, a combination or a side mouse button will do. Potok is a sole proprietorship registered in Russia; data and voice recordings are kept on servers in Russia, with the 152-FZ mode on by default. For Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text. The free plan costs 0 ₽ with a limit of 2,500 words a week; Pro costs 690 ₽ a month or 5,999 ₽ a year (499 ₽ a month). Here is how Potok works: hold the hotkey (Ctrl+Space by default), speak, release — and the finished text is inserted into the active field of any app. Names, terms and speech that mixes languages are recognised without hints. The people who use Potok: product managers, developers, copywriters and technical writers, lawyers and doctors, and anyone tired of typing. For Microsoft Teams meeting transcription to text you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
Recording to text
Send a recording to Potok's Telegram bot or upload a file of up to 2 GB in the bot's mini app. The first 60 minutes of every month are free.
Open @potok_now_bot in TelegramPrimary sources: yandex.ru · vc.ru · speech2text.ru · audio-2-text.ru
Transcribe a recording in Telegram
Voice messages, video notes, audio and video are transcribed by Potok's Telegram bot @potok_now_bot: forward it a voice message from any chat, or send a file or a YouTube, VK Video, RuTube, Instagram or TikTok link. A short recording comes back as text in the chat, a long one as a file; timestamps and speaker labels can be turned on. The buttons give a short summary, tasks and deadlines, an answer to a question about the recording and export to TXT, DOCX, PDF or SRT. Large files, up to 2 GB, are easier to upload in the bot's mini app, via the Upload button next to the input field. The bot recognizes 100+ languages (the language is detected automatically); 60 minutes per month are free.