Google Meet

Groupthink joins your Google Meet calls as a notetaker, captures the conversation, and turns it into notes, transcripts, and recaps automatically. The notetaker is a participant that joins through the Meet link, so anyone on the call can see it is there. You can have Groupthink join automatically based on your calendar, or add it to a specific call yourself.

Heads up: Adding the Groupthink notetaker to a meeting requires an active trial or paid plan. Without one, the notetaker will not join.

Overview

There are two ways to get the notetaker into a Google Meet call:

• Automatically, based on your calendar and your attendance setting
• Manually, by pasting a Meet link when you want notes for a specific call

Both paths add the same notetaker. The difference is just whether you set it up once on your calendar or add it call by call.

Getting Started

Before the notetaker can join a scheduled meeting, connect your Google Calendar. This lets Groupthink see your meetings and the Google Meet conferencing details attached to them.

Once your calendar is connected, choose how you want Groupthink to attend your meetings (see below). The notetaker will not join anything until you pick an attendance setting.

Auto-join Settings

Your attendance setting lives in Today > Calendar & booking, under the heading How should Groupthink attend your meetings? It is a single choice that applies to all of your future meetings:

Option	What it does
Privately Take Notes	Groupthink records privately through the desktop app. No bot joins the call and other participants do not see Groupthink.
Automatically Join All Meetings	The Groupthink notetaker joins your meetings as a visible participant and shares notes with attendees.
Let Me Choose Each Time	Nothing joins automatically. You add the notetaker to specific calls yourself when you want notes.

For the full walkthrough, including how to fine-tune which meetings Groupthink attends, see Google Calendar.

If your Google Meet uses host admission, admit the Groupthink notetaker from the lobby when it requests to join, the same way you would admit any other guest. Nothing is captured until somebody lets it in, so if the notetaker is left waiting the meeting produces no notes at all. See The Notetaker Was Not Admitted to Your Meeting.

Adding the Bot Manually

You can add the notetaker to any Google Meet call, including impromptu calls that are not on your calendar.

1. Open the agenda for the meeting and click Start Notetaker
2. Choose Public with Bot
3. In the Start the Notetaker window, paste your link into the Meeting URL field (the placeholder reads Paste your Google Meet, Zoom, or Teams link here). If the meeting already has a call link, it is filled in for you.
4. Click Start Notetaker

If the agenda has no call link and you use Google Calendar, choosing Public with Bot creates a new Google Meet and opens it in a new tab instead of opening the window. To paste the link of a call that is already running, open + New at the top of the left sidebar and choose Join by link…. The Start the Notetaker window opens with the Meeting URL field ready.

On the web, an agenda with no upcoming calendar event shows this form on the page itself, with no Start Notetaker menu to open first. If you use Google Calendar, click Already in a meeting? Add your Meet, Teams, or Zoom URL to reach the Meeting URL field.

Groupthink will join the call as a participant and begin taking notes. The same flow works for Zoom and Microsoft Teams links, so you can paste any Meet, Zoom, or Teams URL.

When the notetaker joins, its video tile shows a static identity slide with its display name and a Taking notes line. It does not display a running feed of the conversation or your notes on the call.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why did the notetaker not join?

A few things have to be in place: the meeting needs a Google Meet link, your attendance setting has to allow the notetaker to join, and your workspace needs an active trial or paid plan. The notetaker also waits on an invite you have not answered when nobody else on it is a coworker or a contact. See Unanswered invites from people you do not know. It also does not join a task block, a block only you are on that you made, even when the block has a video link. See Task blocks on your calendar.

If the notetaker did reach the call but sat outside it, that is a different problem with a different fix. See The Notetaker Was Not Admitted to Your Meeting.

Does this work with Zoom and Teams too?

Yes. You can paste any Google Meet, Zoom, or Microsoft Teams link when you add the notetaker manually.

Is the notetaker visible to other people on the call?

It depends on your setting. With Automatically Join All Meetings or when you add it manually with Public with Bot, the notetaker is a visible participant. With Privately Take Notes, nothing joins the call and your recording stays private to you.

Can I add the notetaker to a call that is not on my calendar?

Yes. Open + New at the top of the left sidebar, choose Join by link…, and paste the meeting link into the Meeting URL field. The call does not need to be on your calendar.

If the call is on one of your connected calendars and starts within an hour of when you paste the link, the meeting is set up as if you had started it from your calendar: it is named after the event and the event's guests are linked to it, so Send recap to attendees works as it does for any calendar meeting. If two different events in that hour use the same link, Groupthink does not guess and links neither.

If the call is not on your calendar, the meeting takes the call's own title once the notetaker joins, when Zoom or Teams provides one. It is called New Meeting only when there is no title to use, and a name you gave the meeting is never replaced. After the recap, a meeting still called New Meeting or the call's own title takes the recap's title as its name. A meeting named after a calendar event keeps that name, and the recap's title shows on a line under it (see Automatic Meeting Notes). On the meeting's recap page, a Who was this with? box lists the names the notetaker saw on the call. For each name, choose Link to followed by your contact of that name, Add as new to make a new contact (the button reads Add followed by the name when you have no contact of that name), or Not them to stop suggesting it. Nobody is linked until you choose.

What does the notetaker show on its video tile?

A static identity slide with its display name and a Taking notes line. It does not show a live slide of the conversation or your notes.

Getting Help

Questions about the Google Meet integration? Email support@groupthink.com.