Zoom is a popular choice for recording video conversations, making it easy to collaborate with guests and cohosts. By connecting Zoom with Descript, you can simplify your workflow by directly importing Zoom cloud recordings into Descript. This integration helps automatically set up new projects, adds files to your composition, transcribes the recordings, assigns speaker labels, and prepares your project for immediate editing.
If you encounter issues importing Zoom recordings, please visit our troubleshooting page for assistance.
Setting up Zoom to work with Descript
To ensure a seamless workflow between Zoom and Descript, start by optimizing your Zoom settings. This will maximize the flexibility and quality of your recordings, making the subsequent editing process in Descript much smoother. Follow these steps to get started:
Optimize Zoom’s Recording Settings (optional)
The settings you configure on Zoom's webpage apply specifically to cloud recordings. Changes made within the Zoom application (in-app menu) will not affect your cloud recording settings. Therefore, always use the web interface to apply these settings correctly.
- Select Record active speaker with shared screen.
- This provides a separate video file that shows the active speaker and the shared screen (if relevant).
- Select Record gallery view with shared screen.
- This provides a gallery view of all the participants with any screen-shared content. Giving you more options while editing.
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Record audio-only files and Record a separate audio file of each participant.
- This enables the most accurate speaker label assignment per participant in Descript. Without this, you might have to identify each speaker in the recording manually.
- Uncheck Add a timestamp to the recording and Display participants' names in recordings.
- This will avoid adding burnt-in timestamps and participant names to the recordings imported into Descript.
- Select Optimize the recording for 3rd party video editor.
- This optimizes video quality to get the best fidelity recordings out of Zoom.
Here’s a snapshot of the recommended settings we suggest you set for Zoom’s cloud recordings:
Increase Video Resolution
To increase the resolution of Zoom's cloud recordings, enable "Meeting-HD Video Quality." Note that this is only available on select Zoom plans.
Currently, Zoom does not support or have a setting for recording individual video files for each participant. You only have the option to have a gallery view or active speaker view of the recording.
Log into Zoom from within Descript
- Open Descript: Fire up the Descript app on your device.
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Navigate to Settings: Click on your profile picture or initials in the top right corner to open the dropdown menu, then hit Settings.
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Connect with Zoom: Select “Connect with Zoom”. This gives Descript access to import files directly from Zoom.
- Now you are ready to import your zoom recordings!
If your organization restricts the use of Zoom apps, your IT department or administrator must grant permission to connect Descript's Zoom integration with your corporate Zoom account. Additionally, please ensure that the domain *zoom.us is whitelisted.
Unlinking Zoom and Descript
If you no longer wish to have your Zoom and Descript accounts connected, you can follow these steps to unlink the two accounts:
- Open your account settings and select Connected Apps under the Account section.
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Log out: Next to the Account connected setting, select the dropdown with your connected Zoom account, and select Log out from the drop-down.
Once logged out, you will not be able to import or create projects from Zoom using this integration; however, any recordings that were imported in the past will remain fully accessible.