Transcripted vs Microsoft Copilot

Why local processing matters

Microsoft Copilot is a useful tool if you're already paying for M365 Enterprise. But its core architecture — cloud processing — creates a trust dependency you can't opt out of. Every meeting you record, every conversation you have, goes through Microsoft's servers. That includes sensitive discussions: compensation reviews, client strategy, product roadmaps, hiring decisions.

With Transcripted, audio is processed on your Mac using Apple's Neural Engine. The files Transcripted creates live in ~/Documents/Transcripted/. They never touch a server. You can read them, move them, delete them, sync them wherever you want — and no one else can.

That's not a feature. It's an architectural guarantee.

The M365 Enterprise requirement

Microsoft Copilot requires an M365 Enterprise subscription to access transcription features. That's an additional cost on top of your M365 subscription, and it locks you into Microsoft's ecosystem. Transcripted works with any video conferencing tool — Zoom, Google Meet, Teams, WebEx, or anything that can send audio to your Mac.

Transcripted is free and open source, which means it's free to use, free to modify, and free to ship to your whole team. There's no paid tier being planned.

Where Microsoft Copilot is better

To be honest: Microsoft Copilot has AI summaries. Transcripted doesn't yet. If you need automatic meeting summaries, action items, and follow-up drafts inside Teams, Microsoft Copilot does that today.

Microsoft Copilot also has a polished, enterprise-facing UI and a more established product. If you're not technical and want everything in one place without thinking about files, Microsoft Copilot works.

But if you care about privacy, if you're using AI agents that need context about your meetings, or if you don't want to pay for an M365 Enterprise subscription just for transcription — Transcripted is the answer.