Use Zoom's AI to Auto-Generate Meeting Summaries

What This Does

Zoom's AI automatically transcribes your library meetings and generates a structured summary with key topics discussed, decisions made, and action items. delivered to your inbox within minutes of the meeting ending.

Before You Start

• Your Zoom account is on an eligible paid Zoom Workplace plan (Pro, Business, or higher). Zoom also offers a free tier, ZoomMate Basic, capped at 3 hosted meetings per month
• You're the meeting host or your organization admin has enabled meeting summaries
• You have Zoom desktop app installed and updated

Steps

1. Find the meeting summary setting

Sign in at zoom.us and open Settings. Look for the meeting summary controls in the AI section and confirm that automatic meeting summaries are turned on. Zoom used to call these features "AI Companion" and dropped that name in 2026, so older help articles and colleagues may still use the old term.

2. Start it when your meeting starts

Once you're in the meeting, hover over the AI icon in the meeting controls toolbar at the bottom. Select the Meeting summary checkbox, then click Start Zoom AI. A notification appears in the meeting letting participants know a summary is being generated.

3. Review and use the result

When the meeting ends, Zoom emails you (and optionally participants) a summary. It includes: meeting overview, key topics, decisions, and action items with names attached. Edit the summary if needed, then paste it into your staff email, meeting notes document, or shared folder.

Real Example

Scenario: You just finished a 60-minute staff meeting covering summer reading program planning, a policy update on unattended children, and a budget discussion about a database renewal.

What you type/do: As the meeting starts, tick the Meeting summary checkbox and click Start Zoom AI.

What you get: Within 5 minutes of ending the meeting, you receive an email summary like:

• Summer Reading Program: Planning begins April 1. Sarah to confirm theme with ALA by March 28. Marcus to contact school liaison.
• Unattended Children Policy: New policy effective April 15, children under 8 must be with adult. Director to send staff memo.
• Database Renewal: JSTOR renewal decision needed by April 30. Director to pull usage stats and present to board.

Time saved: 45 minutes of post-meeting note-taking, every meeting.

Tips

• Remind participants at the start of the meeting that AI summarization is on. professional courtesy and required by most privacy policies
• You can also use Zoom's in-meeting AI chat mid-meeting: ask "What has been discussed so far?" or "What action items have we agreed on?"
• If action items are misattributed, you can edit the summary before distributing it

Tool interfaces change, if a button has moved, look for similar AI/magic/smart options in the same menu area.