Take meeting notes on a Mac without leaving the call

To take meeting notes on a Mac during a call without leaving it, keep the call in view and bring the note to it, not the other way round. Tile the call and your notes side by side, or use a note that drops over the call and tucks away with one key. If you present, share a single window rather than the whole screen, so your notes stay private. Inkling takes the second approach from the notch: Option-N, type, Command-Return.

Why switching apps mid-call goes wrong

The usual way to take notes in a call is to switch to a notes app, type, and switch back. Each switch has a cost:

• You lose the room. The call window goes behind your notes, and with it the faces, the shared slide and the chat.
• Your notes can end up on screen. If you are sharing the entire screen when you switch, everyone sees what you type.
• You fall behind. By the time you are back, the decision you wanted to write down has been followed by two more.

The fix is a setup that keeps the call where you can see it and puts the note one key away.

Arrange the screen before the call

A minute before the call starts, set the windows up.

On one screen, tile them. Hover over the green button at the top left of the call window and choose one of the options that tiles it to the left side of the screen, then put your notes window on the right. On recent versions of macOS you can also drag a window to the left or right edge of the screen to tile it there. Keep the call large enough to read a shared slide.

With a second display, split by job. Put the call on the display with the camera, so that looking at people means looking near the lens, and keep your notes on the other one.

Turn on Do Not Disturb. Open Control Center from the menu bar and turn on a Focus, so banners do not land on top of the call or your notes.

Share a window, not your screen

If you might present, decide what to share before you need to. Calling apps usually offer a choice between the entire screen and a single window. Sharing one window, such as the slides, keeps your notes, your email and everything else off the call, even when you switch to them.

When you share the entire screen, assume everything on it is visible, including any note that opens over other windows. If you need to write while sharing the whole screen, stop sharing for a moment or keep your notes on a second display that is not being shared.

macOS also lets you decide whether notifications appear while you share. In System Settings, Notifications has an option to allow notifications when mirroring or sharing the display. Leave it off, so a private message does not pop up in front of everyone.

A note format that keeps up with talk

Meetings move faster than typing. A fixed layout helps, because you never stop to decide where something goes.

• Top line: the meeting name and the date.
• People: who is there, as initials.
• Decisions: one line each, written as the decision, not the discussion. “Launch moves to the 14th” rather than “talked about the launch date”.
• Actions: a checkbox per action, with the owner’s initials and a date. Write it the moment someone says “I’ll do that”.
• Questions: anything left open, so it is not lost between meetings.
• Notes: everything else, in whatever order it comes.

If actions pile up, a table reads faster than a list: three columns for what, who and by when.

Right after the call, while it is fresh, read the note once. Fix half-typed words, add the dates nobody said out loud, and send the decisions and actions to whoever needs them. That last step is the one most meeting notes never get.

Notes from the notch

Inkling puts the note above the call instead of beside it. Hover over the notch or press Option-N, and a note opens beneath the notch, over the call window, without moving it. Type the decision, press Command-Return, and the note tucks away while Ink, the pair of eyes in the notch, gives a nod. Open it again and the same note is there, so a meeting’s notes build up in one place.

The parts that fit meeting notes in particular:

• A meeting template to start from. Shape it once into the layout above and save it as your own template, so the sections are there from the first line.
• Checkboxes, headings and tables, with Tab moving between cells when you fill in an action table.
• Tags and links between notes, so each meeting can point to the project or client note it belongs to, and you can follow a tag across a series of meetings.
• Search for a phrase across past meetings, for the day someone asks what was agreed.
• Export as Markdown, rich text or PDF, for sending the recap.

If Ink’s eyes catch your attention while someone is talking, set its mood to Still. On an external display without a notch, a virtual notch appears in the same spot, so the same keys work at a desk.

Be clear about what it is. Inkling does not record, transcribe or summarize meetings; there are no AI features, and you type the notes yourself. There is no sharing or collaboration, so notes several people edit together belong in a shared document. It runs on the Mac only, on macOS 14 Sonoma or later, and costs $12 once, with 24 hours free and no card needed.

Questions

Will people on the call see my notes? Only if they can see your screen. Share a single window and they see that window alone. Share the entire screen and they see whatever is on it, notes included.

Can I take notes while I present? Yes, if you share a window rather than the screen. Your notes stay off the call while everyone keeps seeing the shared window.

Does the notch app record the call? No. It is for notes you type. If you need a recording, use your calling app’s own recording, with everyone’s agreement.