Using Akume with Zoom

On Zoom, Akume joins an ordinary meeting as a participant. There is no Zoom app to install: you paste the meeting link, somebody in the call admits the translator, and from that moment every speaker is translated as they talk. The translator speaks the translation aloud right in the call, captions appear on its tile, and anyone can also follow along on a listener link in their browser. These notes cover Zoom meetings; webinars are a separate case, covered at the end.

Use the right link

Akume needs the join link for the meeting itself: a zoom.us address, the one Zoom hands you when you copy the invitation. Paste it complete, including everything after the question mark: that part carries the passcode, and a link trimmed back to the meeting number cannot be joined.

Start the call, then send the translator in

1. Start the Zoom meeting, or have the host start it. A meeting that has not begun has nobody to admit a participant.
2. Paste the Zoom link into Akume, list the languages that will be spoken in the call (from 2 to 10, see Languages and how they are chosen), and start the session.
3. Watch the participant list. The translator appears there like any guest, usually within a few seconds.
4. Admit it if a waiting room is enabled. The host gets the usual prompt and clicks admit; a co-host can do it just as well. Without a waiting room the translator walks straight in.
5. Share the listener link with anyone who also wants captions, or a language of their own, in a browser tab: everyone in the call already hears the translation spoken aloud. As soon as the translator is in the call it posts the link in the Zoom chat itself (a short message in English), and Akume copies it to your clipboard as the session starts in case you need to paste it. Listeners choose a language; if the status line asks them to press play, one tap on Play starts the audio, and the same button pauses.

Settings worth checking

• Waiting room. If a waiting room is enabled, nothing needs changing; just be ready to admit the translator in the first seconds of the call, or ask a co-host to keep an eye out.
• Join before host. If participants are not allowed to join before the host, the meeting has to be running before Akume is sent in.
• Recording permission. When the translator joins, Zoom asks the host to allow it to record. The translator cannot work without that permission; no recording is kept after the call.
• Passcodes. Keep the invite link intact. A shortened link that lost its passcode is the most common reason a join fails.
• Recurring meetings. A recurring Zoom meeting keeps the same link, so the same paste works again next week.
• The language list is fixed at the start. Adding a language later means stopping the session and starting a new one, which also produces a new listener link.
• Headphones if you are following along. Anyone who opens the listener link while sitting in the meeting should listen through headphones: translated speech coming out of laptop speakers goes back into everyone else’s call through the microphone.

Webinars and registration-required meetings

Zoom webinars and meetings that require registration or a signed-in Zoom account are not supported out of the box yet. If you need the translator in one of these, write to support@akume.ai and we will help you set it up.

Meeting somewhere else? The flow is the same in Google Meet and Microsoft Teams, and Your first meeting with Akume walks through the whole thing from signing up.