Brainstorm can record a lecture, meeting, or your own voice and turn it into a searchable transcript, all on your Mac. Nothing is uploaded: the audio and the transcription both stay on this machine.
Record a page
Open the page you want to attach the recording to, then use the microphone button in the toolbar:
- Record Microphone captures from your Mac's microphone.
- Record System Audio captures whatever is playing through your Mac (a video call, a lecture video), without recording your screen.
The first time you record, Brainstorm asks for permission and explains that the audio stays local. macOS will also prompt for microphone or audio-capture access the first time. See Setting up permissions below if a prompt does not appear.
While recording, a bar appears along the bottom of the page with a live level meter and a timer:
- Mark (or press Command M) drops a bookmark at the current moment, so you can jump back to the important parts later.
- Stop ends the recording and starts transcription.
Setting up permissions
The notebook works fully with no permissions at all. Recording is the one feature that needs your say-so, because macOS protects the microphone and your Mac's audio. Brainstorm never asks for anything until you reach for the record button.
There are two permissions, and you only need the one that matches how you record:
- Microphone: to record from your Mac's built-in or external microphone.
- Screen Recording: to capture your Mac's own sound (a video or call playing on this Mac). Only audio is captured, never a picture of your screen.
The first time you open Brainstorm, a short Set up recording window walks you through both. You can turn them on then, or skip and do it later. You can reopen it any time from the ... menu in the sidebar (Set Up Recording), or from Settings > Permissions.
Each permission shows a live status:
- Granted: you are all set.
- Not granted: you have not been asked yet. Click Grant to see the macOS prompt.
- Denied: you turned it down before, so only System Settings can turn it back on.
flowchart TD
A[Click Record] --> B{Permission granted?}
B -- Yes --> C[Recording starts]
B -- No --> D[A friendly notice appears]
D --> E[Set Up: grant it, or Open System Settings]
E --> C
If no prompt appears
macOS only shows each permission prompt once. If you dismissed it, or turned the permission off later, use Open System Settings and switch Brainstorm on by hand:
Microphone
- Find Brainstorm in the list.
- Turn its switch on.
Screen Recording
- Find Brainstorm in the list.
- Turn its switch on.
- Quit and reopen Brainstorm so the change takes effect.
Screen Recording is the one permission macOS only applies after you relaunch the app, so quit and reopen Brainstorm once you have switched it on.
Transcription
When you stop, Brainstorm transcribes the audio on-device with a whisper speech model. The first time, it downloads the model you chose in Settings (this happens once). The bottom bar shows download and transcription progress.
The transcript is saved as a standard WebVTT (.vtt) file right next to your page, so it is
readable in any text editor and by tools like Obsidian.
Reading a transcript
Open the microphone menu and choose Show Transcript. Each line shows its timestamp; click a line to play the audio from that moment. Your marks appear as labelled bookmarks in the flow. Copy as Markdown puts the whole transcript, with timestamp links, on the clipboard so you can paste it onto the page or into another note.
Choosing a model
Open Settings (Brainstorm > Settings, or Command ,) to pick a transcription model and manage downloads:
- Base (English) is the default. On Apple silicon it keeps up with real lectures.
- Small is more accurate but slower. Multilingual variants are available if you record in other languages.
Models download once and are stored on your Mac; you can remove any you are not using.
Where the files live
Recording writes plain files next to your .brainstorm page:
YourPage.m4a(orYourPage.system.m4afor system audio): the recording.YourPage.vtt: the transcript.
Because these are ordinary files, they travel with your notebook and stay readable outside Brainstorm. Recording is turned off on locked notebooks, so nothing unencrypted is ever written beside an encrypted page.