Recording calls and meetings in the UK: the law in plain terms

What governs a participant's recording is mostly data protection law: once a recording is made for work, the UK GDPR expects a reason, a notice to the people recorded, and a limit on how long you keep it.

So the working answer is the same one most organisations reach: tell people you are recording, say why, and keep it only as long as you need it. This guide sets out the layers that lead there. For the wider picture, including countries where everyone must agree, see is it legal to record a meeting?

The short version

Layer 1: interception, which is about other people's calls

Section 3 of the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 makes it an offence to intentionally intercept a communication in the course of its transmission, without lawful authority. Section 4 defines interception in terms of making the content available to a person who is not the sender or the intended recipient.

That is why the Act is commonly read as not catching a participant who records their own call: they are already the intended recipient. It catches the person who listens in from outside.

Businesses that monitor communications on their own systems — a call centre recording customer calls, for instance — rely on the Investigatory Powers (Interception by Businesses etc. for Monitoring and Record-keeping Purposes) Regulations 2018. These replaced the Telecommunications (Lawful Business Practice) (Interception of Communications) Regulations 2000, which older guides still cite. They permit monitoring for purposes such as keeping a record of transactions or checking standards, provided the system controller has made reasonable efforts to tell the people using the system.

If you are recording a Zoom or Teams meeting you are in, for your own notes, this layer is rarely the one that matters. The next one is.

Layer 2: data protection, which is about what you do with it

A recording of a meeting holds personal data about everyone in it: their voices and what they said. The transcript and any notes do too. The UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018 (both since amended) apply to that data unless the activity is purely personal or household.

A recording made for work — by an employee, a consultant, a sole trader or a charity — generally is not personal in that sense. The structure is the same as the EU GDPR, and recording meetings under GDPR goes through it step by step. In short:

• Someone is the controller. Usually your employer if you record as part of your job; you, if you are self-employed.
• You need a lawful basis. Legitimate interests is common for business meetings; consent fits where people can genuinely say no.
• People must be told at the time: who is recording, why, who receives it, how long it is kept.
• Keep it only as long as the purpose needs, and decide that period in advance.
• Every service that touches it is a processor and needs a contract.

What the ICO says about recording calls

The Information Commissioner's Office's guidance on monitoring workers (checked 25 September 2026) addresses call recording directly. Among its points:

• It is "not usually proportionate to monitor or record the content of calls in all cases."
• Recording may be justified where it is necessary, for example to provide evidence of business transactions, or for training or quality control.
• Workers must be told about call monitoring in your privacy information, and personal calls should not be routinely monitored.
• Audio recording is described as more intrusive than purely visual recording, and the guidance suggests audio capability be off by default.

The guidance is written for employers monitoring staff, not for someone taking notes in their own meetings. But it shows how the regulator thinks: audio is intrusive, recording everything by default is hard to justify, and people must know.

Layer 3: your employer, your client and your regulator

Many UK organisations have their own rule on recording meetings, and client contracts sometimes forbid it or limit which tools may process client data. Regulated firms have their own layer on top: financial services firms, for example, are required by the FCA to record certain calls, which is the opposite problem.

None of these is the law in the general sense, but breaking them has consequences of its own. Check them before you check anything else.

Recording calls with people outside the UK

A call with someone in Germany, California or Pennsylvania may bring their rules into play, and several of those require everyone's agreement before a conversation is recorded. See one-party and two-party consent for the US picture. The practical approach is to follow the strictest rule that could apply, which in almost every case means saying you are recording and giving people the chance to object.

What to do before you press record

1. Check your employer's or client's policy on recording meetings.
2. Decide why you are recording and how long you will keep the audio, the transcript and the notes.
3. Say at the start of the call that you are recording, what for, and who will see it. How to ask for consent to record has scripts.
4. If someone objects, stop, or take notes by hand instead.
5. Know where every copy goes, including any transcription or AI service.
6. Delete what you no longer need, on the schedule you set.

How Notey fits into this

Notey does not decide any of the questions above for you. It keeps the list of places the data goes short, which makes the notice and the retention decision simpler to write.

• The audio stays on your Mac. It is recorded to your disk and transcribed there with Apple's on-device speech recognition. No transcription service receives it.
• Nothing leaves a Mac with no account. Recording, transcription and search work with no account and no network.
• AI notes send transcript text only, when you ask or when a meeting ends if you have turned write-ups on. The text goes to Notey's service and on to OpenAI as a processor, which does not train on it; Notey does not keep it after the response. The privacy policy has the detail.
• Deleting a meeting removes its recording, transcript and notes, from every one of your Macs if sync is on, which helps when you apply a retention period or answer an erasure request.
• A red dot and an elapsed timer show whenever audio is being kept. They are visible to you, not to the other people on the call, so telling them is still your job.

Frequently asked questions

Is it legal to record a phone call in the UK without telling the other person?

No single UK law says every participant must agree, and the interception offence is aimed at people who are not party to the call. But once you use the recording for work, or share it, data protection law and other rules apply, and they generally expect people to be told. Telling them is the safe default.

Do I need consent to record a work meeting in the UK?

Not necessarily consent in the UK GDPR sense. Employers often rely on legitimate interests instead, because consent from staff is rarely freely given. What the law does expect is that people are told the meeting is being recorded and why.

Does the UK GDPR apply to a recording I make for myself?

Purely personal or household activity falls outside it. A recording made for work, even by a sole trader on their own laptop, is generally not personal in that sense.

What replaced the Lawful Business Practice Regulations 2000?

The Investigatory Powers (Interception by Businesses etc. for Monitoring and Record-keeping Purposes) Regulations 2018, made under the Investigatory Powers Act 2016. They carry over the same approach.

Can I use a secret recording as evidence in a UK tribunal or court?

Courts and employment tribunals have admitted covert recordings in some cases and refused them in others. Whether a recording is admissible, and what making it secretly does to your position, is a question for a lawyer.