Questions about Aside

No. Aside records your microphone and the sound your computer plays, so no bot joins and nobody gets a join request. Bot notetakers vs recording on your computer explains the difference.

Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Slack huddles, FaceTime and any other call app, plus phone calls through your computer and meetings in the room. It hears your computer’s audio rather than connecting to the app, so there’s nothing to install in Zoom and no admin approval. See Works with.

No. Aside’s pill, cards and note field are hidden from screen sharing on Mac and Windows, even when you share your whole screen. The main Aside window isn’t, so keep it closed while you share.

No. It records audio from both sides and keeps it on your computer, with playback of your microphone and their audio in sync.

Yes. Press ⌃⌥N or Ctrl+Alt+N in any app, type a line and press Enter, and the note lands in the transcript at the moment you started typing. Press ⌃⌥P or Ctrl+Alt+P to pause for anything off the record, and the transcript marks the gap.

In a one-to-one, the other voice takes its name from the calendar invite. Otherwise it suggests names from clues in the call, like a name said aloud, and shows the reason. Voices you’ve confirmed before are named for you, and one click undoes a name.

When the call app hangs up, or nobody has spoken for a while, the pill counts down and stops the recording. Press Keep recording to carry on.

Yes. Recording laws differ by place, and many require everyone’s consent. Tell people at the start, for example with a line in the call’s chat.

Only if you’ve added a language the on-device model doesn’t know (then all your calls are) or your computer is too slow to keep up, and on Free only the calls Aside guides. Aside transcribes English and 24 European languages on your computer with an on-device speech model. If you’ve added a language the on-device model doesn’t know, all your calls are sent to a speech-to-text service, with the title, plan, names and terms; so is a call on a computer too slow to transcribe it live. On Free, only guided calls are transcribed online; in 13 of the online-only languages, the rest are transcribed on your computer after the call. The audio is sent as you talk, and for a language the on-device model doesn’t know, again after the call if the live transcript missed lines, and when you press Transcribe. Voiceprints always stay on your computer. See the privacy page.

When you’re signed in, meeting text syncs to your account: titles, transcripts, summaries, notes, plans and speaker names, plus your playbooks. That lets connected AI apps read it. Audio does not sync.

Aside reads your calendar on your computer and never changes it. Only titles, times and attendee names for the next two weeks sync to your account, and each is deleted once the meeting has ended. Descriptions, links and email addresses stay on your computer; a call transcribed online sends its title, attendee names and their companies (from their email domains) with its audio.

Live guidance sends your plan, your playbook, what Aside remembers about the people on the call and a recent stretch of the transcript. A write-up sends the whole transcript. Audio never goes to an AI model; calls transcribed online go only to our speech-to-text providers.

No. Nothing you record or write in Aside is used to train AI models.

A small pill just under your camera. Your goals are dots that fill in as you cover them, one line suggests your next move, and the answer you prepared appears when its topic comes up. Free gets it on 2 calls a week, and the paid plan on every call. See features.

Yes. Hover the pill and press What should I say?, press ⌃⌥A or Ctrl+Alt+A, or type a note that ends in a question mark. The answer appears under the pill and says where it came from: your plan, your playbook, memory or the call. It works on any guided call: 2 a week on Free, every call on the paid plan.

On the paid plan, for calendar meetings with people from other companies. It searches the web the day before, or when you press Research attendees, and adds a short brief to the plan: who they are, the people, what to ask and what to avoid. Only the meeting’s title, the attendees’ names and their email domains are sent.

No. A plan is optional. Without one, or with guidance turned off, the pill is only a recording light and Aside just records.

How you run a kind of call, such as a discovery call, demo or interview, written as one plain document: how to coach you, the flow, what to listen for, objections and replies, and facts to have ready. A plan can name a playbook, and live guidance reads all of it during that call. See playbooks.

In the app, New playbook opens a gallery of nine starter playbooks to add and make your own. A connected AI app can also turn your sales script or a doc into one.

On a guided call (every call on the paid plan, 2 a week on Free), a summary, the goals you reached, next steps, their questions and objections, and a follow-up email to copy. The promises made on the call, yours and theirs, go to Promises, and each person you meet gets a page with what Aside remembers about them. Any meeting with a summary can have a link to its notes, on Free too. The people you send it to see the title, date, summary and next steps, never the transcript, the recording or the plan. On Free you still get the transcript with your notes in place. On Free, only guided calls are transcribed online; in 13 of the online-only languages, the rest are transcribed on your computer after the call.

Yes. Aside has an MCP connector at https://mcp.asidehq.app. Once you add it, the app can read your meetings and write your meeting plans, playbooks and memory. See Connect AI apps.

Claude on the web or desktop, ChatGPT on the web with Plus or Pro, and any app with MCP, such as Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, VS Code, Gemini and Grok. See Claude and ChatGPT.

Yes. Press ⌘K or Ctrl+K in the app and type a word: it finds meetings, people and playbooks, and the moments in past calls where it was said. On the paid plan, type a question there and Aside answers it from your past meetings, with the meetings it came from. Connecting an AI app like Claude is still possible, and still the way to have an AI app act on your meetings.

No. Copy the summary or follow-up email from Aside, or use a connected AI app. There’s no API.

Yes, for recording, notes, transcripts, speaker names and search, with no meeting limits, plus live guidance and a write-up on 2 calls a week. On Free, only guided calls are transcribed online; in 13 of the online-only languages, the rest are transcribed on your computer after the call. Research briefs, and guidance and write-ups on every call, are paid. See pricing.

$48 a month, or $456 a year, which works out at $38 a month.

Yes. New accounts get 14 days of the paid features, with no card, and each day in the first week that Aside guides a call of 10 minutes or more adds a day, up to 7 more. After that you move to Free unless you pick a plan.

Not yet. A team plan is planned at $58 per person a month, or $46 yearly, from 3 people, with shared plans and answers and a team library.

Yes, from Settings in the app.

Macs with Apple silicon on macOS 14.2 or later, and PCs with Windows 10 (version 2004 or later) or Windows 11 on x64 with AVX. The speech model downloads once, about 570 MB on a Mac or 920 MB on Windows (720 MB or 990 MB with other European languages). Add a language the on-device model doesn’t know and every call is transcribed online, so only a small model for telling speakers apart downloads. On the free plan, in 13 of those languages, a 990 MB model downloads too, for the calls Aside doesn’t guide. Download Aside.

No. Aside is an app for Mac and Windows, where it lives in the menu bar or the system tray.

English plus 24 European languages on your computer, detected as you speak, and 36 more online, including Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Hindi and Arabic. Choose yours in Settings → Recording. Add one and every call is transcribed online. On Free, only guided calls are transcribed online; in 13 of the online-only languages, the rest are transcribed on your computer after the call.