As AI becomes a larger part of the meeting experience in Microsoft Teams, one question comes up repeatedly when I speak with customers:
“Can we decide when AI should be active during a meeting?”
Until now, the answer has largely been determined before the meeting starts. Organizations configure policies, meeting organizers choose their settings, and participants join knowing whether Copilot, Facilitator, transcription, and recap capabilities will be available.
Microsoft is now introducing a new feature that brings that decision into the meeting itself.
Starting in June 2026, meeting organizers and presenters will be able to turn Meeting AI on or off during a live meeting using a new toggle in the Teams meeting toolbar. This applies to Microsoft 365 Copilot, Facilitator, and meeting recap experiences.
At first glance, this may seem like a small convenience feature. I think it is more significant than that.
Most meetings are not static. A discussion may begin with project updates, move into planning activities, and suddenly shift into a conversation involving sensitive topics, confidential information, or early stage ideas that participants are not yet comfortable capturing through AI generated notes and summaries.
The new toggle gives organizers and presenters the ability to adapt as the conversation evolves. AI can be enabled when participants want assistance with capturing insights, actions, and decisions, and disabled when discussions become more sensitive.
If a meeting organizer enables Meeting AI, Teams will automatically enable transcription and generate recap content. Likewise, if transcription is started, Meeting AI and recap capabilities are also activated. Microsoft is effectively treating transcription as the foundation that allows AI services to understand and process the meeting conversation.
This means that organizations looking to completely avoid AI processing during a meeting must ensure that both transcription and Meeting AI remain disabled.
The good news is that existing governance controls remain fully respected. If Meeting AI is disabled through policy, the toggle will not appear. Licensing requirements remain unchanged, and retention, compliance, recording, transcription, and sensitivity label behaviors continue to function as they do today.
Rather than forcing organizations into an all or nothing approach, Teams is gaining the ability to adapt to the context of the conversation. AI can be available when it adds value and disabled when it does not.
