Desktop app

The Parachute desktop app records in-person meetings and lets you invite the Notetaker bot to online calls, without needing a browser tab open. This guide walks through installing it, signing in, and granting the permissions it needs.

You can start the install from Parachute itself. On the Notetaker page, look for the card headed In-person meeting? and click Download for macOS or Download for Windows. The Installation guide link sits directly below that button and brings you here. To choose a different build, use the … button in the top right of the card and pick from All downloads: macOS (Apple Silicon), Windows (x64) or Windows (ARM64).

What you’ll need

An Apple Silicon Mac, or a Windows 10 or 11 PC
A Parachute account you can sign in with
A few minutes to grant permissions the first time you open the app

Install on macOS

Download the app from downloads.goparachute.ai/desktop/latest/Parachute.dmg
Open the downloaded DMG file. Finder mounts a volume named Parachute holding a single Parachute application icon.
Drag that icon onto Applications in the Finder sidebar. The DMG window has no Applications shortcut inside it, so drag to the sidebar or to an Applications window you open yourself.
Open Parachute from Applications or Spotlight.

Parachute’s builds are signed and notarised by Apple, so the app opens straight away without a Gatekeeper warning.

Parachute opens its own window first, headed Welcome to Parachute, with a Sign in button and a Quit button below it. A grey footnote reads Sign-in opens in your default browser.

Click Sign in. Your default browser opens the usual Parachute sign-in page.
Sign in with your existing Parachute account.
Return to the Parachute app, which swaps the welcome window for the app itself.

The version number sits in light grey at the bottom of the welcome window. You can select and copy it, which is worth doing if you ever need to report a problem.

Grant recording permissions

Recording permissions live under Settings > Account > Recording. This entry only appears in the desktop app, not in Parachute in a browser. Opening the page is what triggers the macOS permission prompts, so visit it before your first meeting rather than waiting for a recording to ask.

The page is headed Recording, with the subtitle Permissions the notetaker needs to record meetings on this computer. Below that sits one row per permission:

Microphone - Captures your voice for the transcript.
Screen and system audio - Captures the audio from the other participants. macOS calls this Screen & System Audio Recording in its own settings.
Accessibility - Lets Parachute find your meeting window. Marked Required for online meetings. In-person recording never needs it.

Each row shows one of these on its right-hand side:

A green Allowed chip. Nothing to do.
An Allow button, when macOS has not asked about that permission yet. Click it, then choose Allow in the macOS dialog that appears in front.
An Open System Settings button, which opens the matching System Settings pane. Accessibility always uses this, because macOS only ever grants it there. Microphone and Screen and system audio switch to it once they have been refused, because macOS will not ask a second time.

If a row carries the note This may be managed by your organisation., that permission is locked by whoever administers your computer and you cannot grant it yourself. Ask them to allow Parachute.

Turning screen recording on from System Settings needs a restart before it takes effect. When that happens the page shows an amber banner reading Screen recording was just turned on. Restart Parachute so it can capture meeting audio. alongside a Restart Parachute button. Use the button. Granting a permission from the Allow prompt instead takes effect immediately and needs no restart.

Once everything is granted, the page shows Everything is set up. The notetaker can record your meetings.

Test with an in-person meeting

Go to the Notetaker page.
Under How are you recording this meeting?, choose In-person meeting.
Read the Recording consent screen, tick the box confirming that all participants have been informed and have consented, then click Continue.
On the Ready to record panel, click the red Start recording button. If it is greyed out, the line below it reads Set up recording permissions to start recording. - go back to Settings > Account > Recording and finish the setup.
The panel heading changes to Recording in progress, a pulsing red dot and an MM:SS timer appear next to the Notetaker heading, and a Live transcript panel fills in as people speak.
Click Stop recording when you are done.

Keyboard shortcuts and the mini bar

Both shortcuts work only while a recording is running, and do nothing otherwise.

Cmd+Shift+Space toggles the Ask AI overlay, a floating panel headed PARACHUTE · Ask AI that sits above your other windows. Press Esc to close it. It is excluded from Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet screen shares, so the people you are meeting with cannot see it.
Cmd+Shift+M toggles the mini bar, a small dark pill you can drag anywhere on screen. It holds a + Ask button that opens the same overlay, a red square button that stops the recording, and an eye button that hides the pill again.

On Windows, use Ctrl+Shift+Space and Ctrl+Shift+M.

Parachute keeps an icon in the macOS menu bar, or the Windows system tray. The icon looks the same whether or not you are recording, so use the Notetaker page or the mini bar to confirm a recording is running.

Clicking the icon opens a menu holding Open Parachute, Toggle overlay, Toggle mini bar, Stop recording, Open logs, Sign out and Quit Parachute. Toggle overlay, Toggle mini bar and Stop recording are greyed out unless a recording is in progress.

Install on Windows

Download the installer for your PC from downloads.goparachute.ai/desktop/latest:
- Parachute-Setup-x64.exe for most Windows PCs
- Parachute-Setup-arm64.exe for Windows on ARM devices
Run the installer.

Windows SmartScreen may show a warning because the app is new. Click More info and check the publisher named in the dialog before going any further. It must read Parachute. If it does, click Run anyway to continue. If the publisher is missing, says “Unknown publisher”, or names anyone else, close the dialog, delete the file and contact support - you may not have downloaded it from the link above.

There is no setup wizard to click through. The installer shows a brief Parachute splash screen while it works, then starts the app for you.

Sign in the same way as on macOS, then open Settings > Account > Recording and allow Microphone. Windows does not gate system audio or accessibility, so Microphone is the only row you will see there.

Automatic updates

Parachute checks for updates about 30 seconds after it starts and every four hours after that, then downloads anything new quietly in the background. Nothing appears on screen while it does.

Once an update is downloaded, you get one notification headed Parachute update ready, whose message names the new version and ends Restart to update. Click the notification to restart into the new version. The menu bar menu also gains a Restart to update item.

Updates never interrupt a meeting. Ask to update mid-recording and Parachute tells you Recording in progress. Restart Parachute after the meeting to finish updating. If you ignore the notification altogether, the update applies the next time you quit and reopen the app.

Troubleshooting

macOS says the app “cannot be opened” or shows a Gatekeeper warning This shouldn’t happen with a signed and notarised build, but if it does: open System Settings > Privacy & Security, scroll down to the message saying Parachute was blocked, click Open Anyway, then confirm in the dialog that follows.

Windows SmartScreen blocks the installer Click More info and confirm the publisher reads Parachute, then click Run anyway. If the option isn’t there, wait a few seconds for SmartScreen to finish its check and try again. Never bypass the warning for an installer whose publisher you can’t confirm - re-download it from the link above and contact support if it still can’t be verified.

The transcript is missing the other participants’ audio This is the Screen and system audio permission. Open Settings > Account > Recording and check that row. If it is not Allowed, use whichever button it offers: Allow if macOS has not asked yet, or Open System Settings to turn Parachute on under Privacy & Security > Screen & System Audio Recording. If you turned it on in System Settings, restart Parachute with the Restart Parachute button on the amber banner before recording again.

Sign-in fails with “Could not sign in. Could not access your local secure storage.” Parachute could not reach the encrypted store it keeps your sign-in in. Restart your computer and try again. If it keeps happening, contact support. On a Mac, it usually means the login keychain is locked or damaged; on Windows, it points at the account’s encryption keys.

A permission says it is managed by your organisation The note This may be managed by your organisation. means the setting is enforced by whoever administers your computer. You cannot change it yourself, so ask them to allow Parachute.

A keyboard shortcut does nothing Both shortcuts only work while a recording is running. They are Cmd+Shift+Space and Cmd+Shift+M on macOS, and Ctrl+Shift+Space and Ctrl+Shift+M on Windows. If one still does nothing during a recording, another app has probably claimed the same key combination. Use Toggle overlay or Toggle mini bar from the Parachute icon in the macOS menu bar, or the Windows system tray, instead.

Reporting a problem to support Two things help: the version number at the bottom of the welcome window, which you can select and copy, and the logs, which you can open with Open logs from the Parachute icon in the macOS menu bar or the Windows system tray.

Next steps

Meeting notetaker - how recording, transcription, and notes work
Credits - understand how meeting recording credits are consumed

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