How to Record a FaceTime Call on Mac

Recording a phone or video call without the other party's knowledge is illegal in many places. In the United States, federal law requires at least one party's consent (typically your own), but many states — including California, Florida, and Illinois — require all parties to consent.

Outside the US, the laws are different again. In the UK, EU, and most of Asia-Pacific, recording without consent ranges from a civil liability to a criminal offense.

Before recording any FaceTime call: tell the other person you are recording and get their explicit agreement. A simple "I'd like to record this call for my notes — is that okay?" is usually sufficient.

Nothing in this guide is legal advice. When in doubt, consult a local attorney or simply ask the other person and get their consent.

1. Before the call starts, press ⇧⌘5 to open the Screenshot toolbar.

2. Click "Record Entire Screen" or "Record Selected Portion." If you choose a portion, frame it around the FaceTime window.

3. In Options, select your microphone. This captures your own voice. FaceTime audio from the other person plays through your speakers or AirPods.

4. Click Record. Start or answer your FaceTime call.

5. When the call ends, press ⌃⌘Esc to stop recording. The .mov file saves to your chosen location (Desktop by default).

Note: If the other person's audio plays through speakers, the built-in mic will pick it up — but quality varies. Using headphones means the mic will not capture their audio. See the audio section below for how to fix this.

1. Open QuickTime Player and go to File → New Screen Recording.

2. Click the dropdown arrow next to the red record button. Select your microphone (or leave as None if you do not want your own voice).

3. Click the red record button, then click your screen to record everything, or drag to select the FaceTime window.

4. Start or join your FaceTime call.

5. Press ⌃⌘Esc or click the stop button in the menu bar when done.

QuickTime gives you a slightly cleaner interface for selecting specific windows versus ⇧⌘5, but both methods produce the same result.

This is the trickiest part of recording FaceTime calls on Mac. The other person's audio comes through your Mac speakers or headphones — it is output, not input — so a standard microphone selection will not capture it.

If you are using built-in speakers: your Mac's built-in microphone will pick up the speaker audio, but quality is poor and you will get echo and background noise mixed in.

Best solution — use a virtual audio device: Install BlackHole (free, open source). Create a Multi-Output Device in Audio MIDI Setup that routes FaceTime audio to both your headphones and BlackHole. Then in ⇧⌘5 or QuickTime, select BlackHole as your recording microphone. This captures the other person's audio cleanly.

Setting up BlackHole: 1. Download and install BlackHole from existential.audio/blackhole/. 2. Open Audio MIDI Setup (search with Spotlight). 3. Click + → Create Multi-Output Device. 4. Check both your headphones (or built-in output) and BlackHole 2ch. 5. Set this Multi-Output Device as your system output in System Settings → Sound. 6. In ⇧⌘5, select BlackHole 2ch as the microphone. You will now capture the call audio cleanly.

This setup is a one-time configuration. Once BlackHole is installed and the Multi-Output Device is created, you can reuse it for any future call recording.

Recording a FaceTime call with ⇧⌘5 or QuickTime does not send any notification to the other participant. They have no in-app indication that you are recording.

This is exactly why the consent step is non-negotiable — macOS does not enforce notification, so you are entirely responsible for telling the other person.

If your screen recording app causes any unusual behavior (lag, dropped frames), the other person may notice video quality changes, but this is rare on modern M-series Macs.

Your recording saves as a .mov file. Open it in QuickTime to review, or drag it into iMovie for editing.

To trim the beginning and end (common with call recordings that start with setup): open in QuickTime, press ⌘T, drag handles, and save.

Name the file immediately with the date and caller name: right-click → Rename in Finder. Call recordings become hard to find later if they all have generic names like "Screen Recording 2026-07-13."

If the recording contains sensitive information, store it in an encrypted folder or use macOS FileVault (System Settings → Privacy & Security → FileVault) to protect your disk.

Neither ⇧⌘5 nor QuickTime will record FaceTime audio perfectly without the BlackHole setup described above. If you need clean two-party audio, BlackHole is the free solution; Rogue Amoeba's Audio Hijack ($65) is the polished commercial option.

Limelight is not suitable for FaceTime recording. Limelight is video-only (no audio capture) and is designed for software tutorials and demos, not call recording.

Zoom, Google Meet, and Teams all have built-in recording features with proper consent notifications to all participants. If you frequently need to record video calls, consider using those platforms instead of FaceTime for work meetings.