How does Focal join my meetings?

Last updated: February 10, 2026

Answer

Focal joins your video meetings automatically based on your joining preferences in Settings. When enabled, Focal's bot (named "Focal Assistant" by default) joins your Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or Google Meet calls to record and transcribe the conversation.

How it works

After connecting your calendar, Focal reads your upcoming meetings and checks whether each one matches your auto-join rules. If a meeting qualifies, Focal's bot automatically joins the video call at the scheduled time. You can also manually toggle Focal to join specific meetings from the Today page.

Steps to enable auto-joining

  1. Go to Settings > Joining meetings
  2. Select your preferred auto-join rule:
    • There's an external guest — only meetings with participants outside your internal domains
    • I'm the organizer — any meeting you created
    • A video link is present — all meetings with a Zoom, Teams, or Meet link
    • Only if I manually add — no auto-joining; toggle meetings on individually from the Today page
  3. Your preference is saved automatically

Steps to manually toggle a meeting

  1. Go to the Today page
  2. Find the upcoming meeting
  3. Toggle the "Join video meeting" switch next to the meeting

Good to know

  • The meeting must have a video conferencing link (Zoom, Teams, or Google Meet) in the calendar event for Focal to join.
  • Focal supports Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet — no separate integration needed for any of them.
  • You can change the bot's display name in Settings > Joining meetings > Bot Name.

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