A recording of a call with only your voice is incomplete. The other person is speaking, you're listening, but the microphone is capturing only one side. System audio — the sound coming out of your speakers or headphones — has to be recorded separately from the microphone, and that requires your Mac to be set up to do it. If the other person's voice doesn't appear in the recording, the most common reason is that the recording app isn't capturing system audio, or system audio capture isn't working on this Mac. The fix depends on where the configuration went wrong.
Why system audio capture is separate from the microphone
When a call comes through your Mac — whether it's Zoom, Teams, a phone call through a VoIP app, or anything else — the other person's voice arrives as system audio. It comes out of your speakers or headphones. Your Mac is playing it so you can hear it. But a microphone only captures what's happening near the microphone: the sound in the room around the device. The other person's voice is coming from speakers or headphones, not from the air, so the microphone doesn't capture it.
To record both sides, your Mac needs to capture two separate audio sources: (1) the microphone input — the sound of you speaking, and (2) the system audio output — what's playing through the speakers. Both have to be recorded at the same time and mixed together. That requires software that's designed to do this, because the Mac doesn't do it by default.
The symptoms of missing system audio
When system audio isn't being captured, the recording will have a very obvious problem: you hear yourself clearly, timestamped and in context, but there are long stretches of silence or text that doesn't make sense. When you listen back, you hear "silence, silence, then I said something, silence." You can't hear what the other person said that prompted your response. The audio is unbalanced — a mostly one-sided recording where one person's words are missing entirely.
If the problem only started halfway through the call, you might have two audio tracks: one part of the call with both sides captured, and then system audio drops out and only the microphone continues. This can happen if something interrupted the audio configuration during the call.
The most common reason system audio isn't captured
Coii AudioNotes needs to be configured to capture system audio, and that configuration has to be in place before you start the recording. The app shows you the audio input sources it can see — usually the microphone and system audio. If you start recording without both selected, only the microphone is captured. This is the first thing to check: did you select system audio as an input before you started the recording?
The app displays audio meters before you start recording. You should see two meters: one for the microphone and one for system audio. If the system audio meter is not visible, or if it's not showing activity when the other person is talking, system audio is not being captured. Some Macs have system audio disabled in their audio settings, which prevents the app from seeing it at all.
Checking whether the Mac supports system audio capture
Not every Mac has equal capability for capturing system audio. Modern Macs running macOS 13 Ventura or later have much better support for system audio capture than older systems. If your Mac is older than Ventura, system audio capture might not work at all, and you'd need to use a different approach — routing audio through an external device, using a different app, or recording calls using the tool's own recording feature (like Zoom's built-in recording) and then transcribing that.
System audio is disabled in your Mac's audio settings
Some Macs have system audio capture disabled by default in their audio input settings. This is a Mac-level configuration, not an app setting. If the app can't see system audio as an available input, the issue is at the OS level. To fix this, you need to enable virtual audio input on the Mac. There are a few ways to do this, but the most common is using free utilities like SoundFlower (older Macs) or its newer equivalent, which creates a virtual audio device that can capture system audio.
If you're not comfortable with utilities, there's an alternative: many video conferencing apps have their own recording features that capture both sides — Zoom, Teams, Google Meet, and others. If you use Zoom's own recording feature, both sides are captured by Zoom itself without needing separate system audio setup on your Mac. You can then transcribe the Zoom recording afterward. This is a workaround, not a primary solution, but it works.
A second audio app is preventing system audio capture
If system audio capture was working and then suddenly stopped, another app might have claimed exclusive access to the audio device. Some audio interfaces, virtual audio utilities, or other recording apps can prevent your app from accessing system audio. Close other audio apps — Discord, another recording app, audio routing utilities — and try again. Most of the time, system audio capture will resume once the competing app is closed.
Similarly, if you switched audio input devices during the call (unplugging headphones, switching to a different USB microphone, changing to AirPods), the system audio configuration might have reset. Restarting the recording after the switch usually fixes this.
Testing system audio capture before a real call
Before a call where you really need both sides captured, do a test. Start a recording, play some audio on your Mac (YouTube, music, anything), and check that the system audio meter is showing activity. Stop the recording and play it back. You should hear the audio you played. If you don't hear it, system audio capture isn't working on this Mac, and you need to troubleshoot before your real call.
This takes two minutes and prevents the situation of finishing a call, only to realize later that half of it is missing.
Checking permission settings for microphone and system audio
On macOS, apps sometimes need permission to access the microphone. If Coii AudioNotes is asking for microphone permission but not seeing system audio, check System Settings → Privacy & Security → Microphone. The app should be listed and toggled on. System audio doesn't require the same permission (it's audio coming out of your speakers, not input from an external device), but if the microphone permission is denied, the app can't record anything.
The difference between recording system audio and speaker volume
A common confusion: controlling the speaker volume is not the same as recording system audio. Speaker volume controls how loud the audio coming out of your speakers is. Recording system audio means capturing what comes out of your speakers as an input source, so it ends up in the recording. You can have the speaker volume at zero and still record system audio, or you can have the speaker volume at full and not record system audio if the app isn't configured to do it. These are independent settings.
Using an external audio interface to capture system audio
On some Macs, using an external audio interface can be simpler than software routing. A USB audio interface with line-in can be connected to the headphone jack (using an adapter), and the other person's audio routed to it. Then the interface becomes an input source that the app can use. This is more complex than software-based capture, but it works on Macs where system audio routing is difficult.
Recording a VoIP call app directly
If you're using a VoIP app like Skype or a phone app, some of them have their own recording features built in. Skype, for example, can record both sides of a call directly. This sidesteps the need to set up system audio capture — the app itself is capturing both sides. The downside is that the recording is tied to that app and might not integrate with a separate transcript tool.
System audio disappears halfway through the call
If system audio capture starts working but then stops mid-call, a few things could be happening:
- Another app took over the audio device. Check whether you got a notification from another app during the call.
- The audio input device was unplugged or switched. If you were using wired headphones and they disconnected, the audio input might have switched.
- The call transferred to a different service (for example, a Teams call transferred to a phone line). The audio routing changed, and system audio capture might have paused.
In each case, restarting the recording is the fix. Some apps can automatically recover from audio input changes; others can't. Starting a new recording ensures both sources are properly configured again.
Checking whether the call app is the problem
If system audio capture works for music or YouTube but not for your video call app, the issue might be with how that app routes audio. Some call apps route audio in a way that bypasses system audio. In these cases, the call app might have its own recording feature that's simpler to use than trying to route system audio. Google Meet, Teams, and Zoom all have built-in recording that captures both sides cleanly.
Using a USB microphone that includes line-in
Some USB microphones have a line-in input that can record from external audio sources. If you have one of these, you can route the other person's audio to the line-in, and then the microphone becomes a single audio input that contains both the microphone and the line-in. This simplifies things: instead of configuring system audio and microphone separately, you configure one USB microphone input that has everything. It requires connecting cables, but it avoids software routing problems.
- 00:15:32YouDid you get the notes from the meeting?
- 00:15:38ThemYes, I got them.
Troubleshooting checklist before a real call
- Start a test recording. Play audio (music, YouTube) on your Mac.
- Check that two meters appear: microphone and system audio.
- Verify that the system audio meter shows activity while the audio plays.
- Stop the recording, play it back, and confirm you hear the audio.
- If you don't see a system audio meter or it's not showing activity, system audio capture isn't working on this Mac yet.
- Close other audio apps and try the test again.
- If it still doesn't work, check whether your Mac is on Ventura or later.
If all of these pass, you're ready for the real call.
When system audio capture fails completely
If your Mac genuinely cannot capture system audio — because it's older than Ventura, or because of hardware limitations, or because software routing isn't working — your options are:
- Use the call app's own recording feature (Zoom, Teams, Google Meet all have them).
- Route audio through an external interface.
- Record the call a different way and transcribe it afterward.
The first option is the easiest and usually gives the best results. Your call app has been designed to record both sides cleanly; it's worth using that feature rather than fighting with system audio configuration.
What it costs, what it runs on
Coii AudioNotes is $19 once, covering three of your Macs, with a 30-day trial that needs no card and no account. It runs on macOS 13 Ventura or later on Apple Silicon or Intel. System audio capture works on both architectures and every version of Ventura and later. How-to-record-a-meeting-on-a-mac covers the full recording workflow. Once you've verified that system audio is capturing correctly, how-to-record-system-audio-on-a-mac walks through the full setup for the first time, and how-to-record-both-sides-of-a-call covers the most common call scenarios and what to expect. What-is-system-audio-capture explains the concept in more depth, while best-meeting-notes-apps-without-a-bot explores tools that respect your privacy. How-to-back-up-your-meeting-recordings shows how to preserve recordings safely once they're captured.