Best apps for recording lectures and taking notes

First, check you are allowed to record

Whatever you use, check your university or school allows recording first, and ask the lecturer if you are unsure. Our guide on how to record lectures covers when it is allowed and how to ask.

Your phone's built-in voice recorder

The simplest option, and free. Recent iPhones can transcribe a recording in the Voice Memos app, and many Android phones have a recorder app that does the same.

• Good for: having the whole lecture to replay, with no setup.
• Not so good for: notes. You get audio and, at best, a block of transcript with no structure, which is a lot to read through.

Note apps that record audio, like Notability and OneNote

These let you write or type notes while recording, and tie the audio to what you wrote, so tapping a line plays what was being said at that moment. Notability, on iPad, is popular for this with handwritten notes, and newer versions add transcripts and study features.

• Good for: students who like writing their own notes, especially by hand, and want the audio as a backup.
• Not so good for: lectures where you cannot keep up. You still write the notes yourself.

Lecture recording tools for accessibility, like Glean

Glean is built around lectures: it records, lets you mark important moments, bring in slides and add your own notes alongside the audio. Many universities provide it free through their disability or accessibility service.

• Good for: students with a learning support plan. Ask your accessibility office whether your university offers it.
• Not so good for: anyone who cannot get access through their university.

Transcription apps, like Otter

Transcription apps turn speech into text live and are good at it. Most, including Otter, are built mainly for work meetings and calls, with features like speaker names and meeting summaries.

• Good for: a searchable word-for-word transcript.
• Not so good for: study notes. A transcript is not notes, and turning an hour of it into something you can revise from is still your job.

AI tools that write the notes, like Grasp

This is the newest kind of tool: it records and transcribes, and then writes structured notes from what was said, with headings, definitions and examples. Grasp writes the notes while the lecture is still going, then saves them into that subject's notebook when you stop. From there you can highlight any line to have it explained, and make a quiz from your notes.

• Good for: lectures that move faster than you can write, and getting straight to notes you can study from.
• Not so good for: replaying the lecture. Grasp does not keep the audio, only the notes, so if you want the recording itself, use your phone's recorder alongside it.
• Worth knowing: AI notes can get things wrong, especially names and technical terms. Read them through once after the lecture.

Which one to choose

• You want to replay the lecture: your phone's voice recorder.
• You write your own notes and want audio as a backup: Notability or OneNote.
• You have a learning support plan: ask your university about Glean.
• You want a word-for-word transcript: a transcription app.
• You want notes written for you that you can study and quiz yourself from: an AI note tool like Grasp.

Whichever you pick, the recording only helps if you go back to it. Read the notes within a day or two, and test yourself on them before the exam rather than the night before.