Recording a podcast with guests who aren't in the same room used to be a technical nightmare. Then Zoom.us came along and simplified remote recording for everyone. What started as a business tool became the unexpected hero for podcasters everywhere—no technical degree required. And the numbers prove it: between 2020 and 2021, Zoom's usage skyrocketed 325%, with many of those users discovering creative applications beyond just work meetings.

Turns out, the same tool that powered your team updates and virtual happy hours also happens to be a surprisingly capable podcast studio in disguise.

With Zoom's built-in recording capabilities, you can capture decent-quality remote interviews without investing in expensive equipment or complex software. It's the podcast starter kit hiding in plain sight that many creators are already using—often completely free.

If you're completely new to podcasting, you might want to start with our step-by-step beginner's guide to build your show on solid foundations. But if you're ready to jump into remote recording, this guide will walk you through everything you need to know about turning Zoom from a meeting tool into your podcast production studio.

Mastering guest preparation for remote podcasts

Guest preparation is more than a courtesy—well-briefed guests lead to more engaging and polished conversations. Provide them with a concise overview of the show's theme, along with any pivotal topics or questions, so they know what to expect and can come prepared. Encourage a quick tech check, ensuring they have a functioning microphone and are comfortable with Zoom’s interface before recording according to this guide. It's also helpful to suggest an environment with minimal echo and background noise to enhance audio quality. Lastly, consider sharing a set of your planned questions in advance, giving guests ample time to formulate meaningful insights. According to podcast equipment recommendations, verifying that your guest’s mic and headphones are in working order reduces mid-episode troubleshooting.

Can you record a podcast on Zoom?

The short answer is yes. Even on the free plan, it's possible to record podcast episodes on Zoom. Zoom has a built-in recording feature that lets you record yourself through your webcam, smartphone, or hooked-up camera and microphone.

From a technical standpoint, the better your audio and video recording equipment, the better your recording will be. Still, you can start minimally with just your laptop or smartphone built-ins.

What's more, you can have multiple guests on your Zoom podcast recording with you, all recorded on separate tracks ready for editing. And thanks to Descript's Zoom integration, editing your Zoom podcast recording is easier than ever.

However, using Zoom to plan and produce your podcast comes with pros and cons.

Advanced audio optimization for Zoom recordings

Achieving top-notch audio involves more than just hitting the record button in Zoom. Since Zoom applies noise reduction and echo cancellation by default, consider enabling the 'Preserve Original Sound' feature to maintain audio fidelity as recommended here. By capturing a fuller frequency range, you'll approach the pro-level standard of 20 Hz to 20 kHz often sought by experienced podcasters. Additionally, manually applying controlled compression after recording can yield more natural dynamics than relying on Zoom’s built-in processing. For a quieter background, use advanced noise reduction tools during post-production, ensuring minimal disruption to the host and guest vocals. Overall, these strategies help maintain clarity and intelligibility, even when dealing with the inherent limitations of VoIP technology.

Pros and cons of recording a podcast on Zoom

It's possible to record your podcast using Zoom, but does that mean you should? Here's everything you need to consider before you start recording a podcast on Zoom.

Benefits of recording a podcast on Zoom

• Zoom has a free plan. You can get started without spending a penny (in theory).
• Since 2020, lots of people have become very familiar with Zoom. This means your guests will likely have fewer problems navigating the software.
• Your podcast guests don't need to download the app. As long as the host has an account to create the meeting, guests can join using a link in their browser.
• You can save a local recording or use Zoom's cloud. Files are easy to find within the Zoom app under “meetings,” then “recorded,” or in whichever folder you have designated for local storage.
• You can connect Zoom to Descript so you can quickly open up your cloud recordings for editing, no downloading or importing required.

Limitations when recording a podcast on Zoom

• Zoom was never designed for podcast recording—it uses Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology, which means calls rely entirely on a live, good-quality internet connection. If you lose connection quality, you also lose audio and video clarity on your recording.
• The benefit of Zoom for video conferencing is that it compresses audio and video for a smoother conference experience. That's bad news for podcasters who want to record with high video and audio quality.
• The free Zoom plan only lets you record up to 40 minutes per meeting, so if you're hoping to have a 40+ minute episode, you're out of luck.
• There are no native options for publishing your podcast to popular podcasting platforms like YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or Amazon Music.

How to record a podcast on Zoom

If you've weighed the pros and cons and still want to try recording your podcast on Zoom, here's the step-by-step guide on how to do it (while optimizing your settings for the best audio quality and easier post-production).

Step 1: Prepare your podcast equipment

To give yourself the best chance of having a successful podcast recording, you need to plan ahead.

Some basic prepping checklist items include: • Checking your internet connection is stable • Testing your microphone and audio settings • Making sure you're in a quiet environment with minimal background noise • Briefing guests on how to optimize their audio setup • Having headphones ready to prevent echo

• Do you have a stable internet connection? Consider plugging directly into your router rather than relying on wifi.
• Are you going to be in a quiet recording environment? Choose a private space with lots of soft surfaces, and let housemates know you're about to record an interview.
• Do you have your audio and video recording equipment ready? Check Zoom's settings to make sure you've chosen the right inputs.
• Have you briefed the guest on what the podcast episode will be about and the topics you plan to cover? Include this in your scheduling email, if you can.

Preparing these factors before you sit down for recording will save you time and headaches later. For the best audio quality, consider recording in a room with soft furnishings to reduce echo and position your microphone about 6-8 inches from your mouth.

Step 2: Schedule your Zoom recording session

Once you've landed on a good date and time for the other hosts or guests for your Zoom podcast, schedule a Zoom meeting by opening the Zoom app and selecting Schedule. Then, send all attendees the link.

Alternatively, you can use the Zoom for Google Workspace add-on to schedule the Zoom meeting directly from a Google Calendar event.

You can also start your meeting right now by just clicking the New Meeting icon.

Step 3: Configure Zoom audio settings

Before you ever schedule your meeting, you'll want to make sure your Zoom settings are correct. That will ensure your podcast audio is the best quality possible and make editing much easier later.

Step 3a: Set up Zoom cloud recordings

Cloud recordings are only available on paid plans, but they're also necessary for the Descript integration.

To set them up properly, first, login to Zoom on the web, click Settings, then head to Recording. ‎

Then, make sure the following settings are checked:

• ☑️ Check Record active speaker with shared screen. This provides a separate video file that shows the active speaker and the shared screen (if relevant).
• ☑️ Check 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.
• ☑️ Check 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.
• ☑️ Check Optimize the recording for 3rd party video editor. This optimizes video quality to get the best fidelity recordings out of Zoom.

Here's what all that should look like:

‎Also, if you have the option (not all plans do), enable "Meeting-HD Video Quality." That will increase the resolution of Zoom's cloud recordings.

Step 3b: Configure Zoom local recordings

In the app, open up the Audio Settings tab:

From there, scroll down a little, and you'll see some options you can enable:

For the best chances of good post-production editing, we'd recommend choosing the "Original sound for musicians" option—this removes all the effects Zoom uses by default for smooth video calling, like high-pass filtering, automatic gain control, and noise suppression. This setting is crucial for capturing high-quality podcast audio on Zoom.

After changing the audio settings, go to the Recording settings on the left panel, then find “Record a separate audio file for each participant,” and toggle it on:

Enabling this setting means you'll be able to edit the separate audio tracks in post-production (e.g., if one speaker used built-in microphones and the other used a studio one, you can use Studio Sound to improve one without affecting the other). This is especially important for podcast recordings with multiple guests.

Step 4: Start your Zoom meeting

The day is here! Time to open up the Zoom app again, navigate to your scheduled Zoom meeting, and hit Start. If you didn't schedule anything, just select the New Meeting icon.

Step 5: Select your podcast recording equipment

From here, select the camera and microphone you want to use for your recording. At the bottom of the meeting screen, you'll see the camera and microphone icons—click on these to open the Zoom settings and select your equipment:

If, for some reason, you can't see your equipment here, try exiting the app and double checking it's all connected properly before opening the app again. If you still can't see it, check your computer's input settings and try again. If all else fails, restart your whole computer.

Still nothing? There may be a fault with your equipment.

Step 6: Record your podcast on Zoom

Now is the moment we've all been waiting for. At this point, feel free to hit Record. If you don't see it on the menu, you'll find it in the More panel—the three dots at the right of the menu icons. Hitting this button will play an automated "Recording in progress" sound. Then, it's off to the races. For the best audio quality on your Zoom podcast, make sure everyone uses headphones and stays in a quiet environment.

Remember, if you're on the free version of Zoom, you'll only have 40 minutes total to start your meeting, get your guest on, and record your conversation. If you've opted to pay for a Pro plan, chat as long as you need. For longer podcast episodes, the Pro plan is definitely worth considering.

Step 7: Edit your Zoom podcast recording

Go ahead and say your goodbyes and end the meeting.

If you've recorded to the cloud, those recordings will show up in your list of cloud recordings on the Zoom web portal.

If you've recorded locally and it's your first time recording as a host, Zoom will prompt you to choose a local storage location to save the recording and convert the video file to an MP4 and the audio to an M4A file.

Now it's time to open your files in your editor of choice. Plenty of podcast editing software options are available, but Descript is arguably the best. In Descript, you can automatically remove filler words like "um" and "uh" and use its AI features, such as Studio Sound and AI Voices, to give your podcast a much cleaner audio experience. For Zoom podcast recordings, Studio Sound is particularly useful for improving audio quality that may have been compressed during the call.

Plus, it's virtually seamless to edit your Zoom recordings in Descript. Here's how:

Step 7a: Import Zoom recordings to Descript

To use the Descript Zoom integration for the first time, you'll need to connect the two apps. Open up Descript, click your profile picture or initials in the top right corner, and choose Settings.

Select Connect with Zoom. ‎This gives Descript access to import files directly from Zoom.

‎You'll only need to do the previous steps once.

Once you're ready to edit your Zoom call, create a new project, and then select Import from Zoom in the script.

‎Next, select your recording from the menu that appears. If you don't see your most recent recording, hold tight—Zoom processes its cloud files after you stop the recording, and it can take some time, depending on how long you recorded and how many people were in the recording. Once they're ready to import, you'll see them in this window.

Step 8: Publish your podcast

There we have it. Your Zoom podcast is ready for the world. With the right settings and proper preparation, you can create professional-sounding podcast episodes even when recording remotely through Zoom.

3 alternatives to recording a podcast on Zoom

Already tried recording a podcast on Zoom and aren't entirely happy with the results? Here are some alternative recording software choices for either video podcasts or audio-only podcasts that might offer better audio quality.

SquadCast by Descript for podcast recording

If you have guests on your podcast (which is likely why you chose to use Zoom first), the upgrade you need is a remote podcast recording tool like SquadCast by Descript.

SquadCast now supports up to 4K remote recording (on a paid plan, but free plans still get up to 1080p). The best part about using SquadCast compared to Zoom is that it's designed specifically for podcast recording, and maintains the quality you need as a podcaster. If you or your guest's internet connection dips, with Progressive Uploads, it won't affect your podcast recording quality—unlike Zoom, which compresses audio and is dependent on stable internet.

Recording at source means you'll get the best audio quality, as if you were in a recording studio. What's more, since SquadCast is part of Descript, you get all its podcast video and audio editing tools, like Studio Sound to remove background noise, echo cancellation, and filler word removal, in one place.

Pricing: Included in all Descript plans—including the free tier.

Skype for podcast recording

Okay, hear me out. Skype has been around for 20 years and is still going strong. Yes, it's still VoIP software, and like Zoom, it was never designed for recording podcasts. However, it still makes a strong case for those who want to do podcast hosting or be a co-host for free.

For one thing, you get 24 hours of call time, which means no more trying to squeeze everything into a 40-minute recording. You can also (with some technical know-how) use Skype to live stream to social media channels such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, and LinkedIn.

These two features alone can be worth jumping ship from Zoom to Skype, but you still suffer the problems of recording a VoIP call, and you don't get the high-quality audio you can get using dedicated software.

Pricing: Skype-to-Skype calls are free; there are various call rates per country for mobile calls.

Riverside.fm for podcast recording

Another podcast recording software option with a great reputation is Riverside. Similar to SquadCast, it specializes in remote podcast video recording at high resolution.

It has many of the same features as SquadCast—you'll get superb recording quality as if you've recorded in a professional production studio and a free starter plan to help you get started. While you'll get a much better podcast recording experience here compared to using Zoom, the editing capabilities aren't as strong as other tools available, you're limited to seven guests per recording, and each recording is watermarked on the free plan.

Pricing: Free plan available; paid plans start at $15/m with annual billing.

FAQ about recording a podcast on Zoom

Can I record audio only on Zoom for podcasts?

Yes! You can record audio on Zoom the same way you record any video call. In this case, if you don't want video, you can turn the video camera off before hitting the record button. Zoom records audio at up to 32kHz, which is adequate for casual podcasts but below the 44.1kHz or 48kHz standard used in professional podcast production.

What's the best way to record a podcast on Zoom?

You can record a podcast on Zoom in a few simple steps: • Schedule a Zoom meeting and invite your guests • Configure your audio settings for optimal recording quality • Enable 'Record a separate audio file for each participant' • Start the meeting and hit Record • Edit your recording in software like Descript

1. Plan what your podcast will be about. If you're including cohosts or guests, schedule a recording time with them.
2. When the time comes, open up your podcast recording software and greet your guest(s).
3. Talk to your guest(s) first about any housekeeping rules or issues.
4. Hit the record button and start your podcast session.
5. Once your recording is finished, edit your file in free podcast editing software like Descript or Audacity.
6. Export your file, select the platforms you want to publish it on, and share it with the world.

Is Zoom the best platform for podcast recording?

Zoom is a great option for recording short (30 minutes or less) podcasts when you're just starting out. However, upgrading your podcast with a dedicated podcast recording tool like SquadCast will significantly improve the audio quality of your podcast and your recording workflow, especially for professional productions.

How can I reduce background noise during a Zoom podcast?

A simple way is to record in a quiet, enclosed space with soft furnishings to absorb echo. Encourage participants to close windows, mute devices, and turn off fans or air conditioners whenever possible. Use dedicated noise reduction tools in post-production as recommended here to further clean up the track. If Zoom’s built-in suppression doesn’t suffice, advanced third-party apps can virtually eliminate hum and static. Wearing headphones during recording also prevents microphone feedback loops that can become distracting.

Do I have to use headphones while recording on Zoom?

Yes, wearing headphones is crucial for preventing audio bleed, where the guest’s voice leaks back into your microphone. It also lets you monitor sound levels in real-time, helping you catch issues like sudden distortion or unexpected background noise as outlined here. Even basic earbuds often work better than using laptop speakers, which can create echoes. Ultimately, headphones help preserve clarity for everyone involved in the recording session.