Google Meet does not save the recording to your computer. It saves it to Google Drive, in a Meet Recordings folder, and usually in the organizer's Drive rather than yours. If you started the recording, you normally get an email with a link, but the file itself lives in someone else's Drive.
That is why so many people search for this. You recorded the call, the file is not on your machine, and it is not in your Drive either. Nothing has gone wrong. It went somewhere you did not expect.
After the meeting ends, Google Meet processes the recording and drops it into a folder called Meet Recordings inside My Drive. Which Drive depends on who organized the meeting, and that is the detail that catches people.
The recording usually goes to the meeting organizer's Drive. If someone else set up the calendar invite and you were the one who pressed record, the file is in their Drive, not yours. You should get an email link to it, and depending on the sharing setup you may be able to open it, but it is not your file to keep.
Processing also takes a while. A long meeting can take longer than the meeting itself to appear, so if you looked five minutes after hanging up and saw nothing, look again later before assuming it failed.
It is still processing. The most common answer, and the easiest to rule out. Check the folder again an hour later.
It went to the organizer's Drive. Search your email for a link before searching Drive. If the link is there and the file will not open, the organizer has to share it with you.
Recording was never available to you. Meet recording is tied to the Workspace edition on the account, and personal Google accounts generally do not have it. If the record option was not there, or was there and greyed out, no file was made. There is more on what your role and plan allow in recording a Google Meet when you are not the host.
It was deleted, or storage ran out. A recording in Drive is subject to the same storage quota and the same admin retention rules as any other file in that account. Check the Drive trash first. After the trash window passes, or once a retention policy has run, it is not coming back.
Then there is nothing to recover, and we would rather say that than send you round a loop of settings menus. A meeting that was not recorded produces no file, and a file that a retention policy removed is not sitting somewhere waiting to be found.
The uncomfortable part is that none of those failures announced themselves during the call. You pressed record, the meeting happened, and the problem only became visible afterwards when you needed the file.
Recording from your own computer takes the organizer, the plan, and the Drive quota out of the question entirely. The file is written to your own disk while the meeting is happening, and it is still there when you go looking.
That is how Jotted works. It records what is on your screen rather than joining the call, so it does not matter whose invite it was or which Workspace edition they are on, and the recording is a file you own. On the free plan nothing is uploaded anywhere at all. There is more detail on where recordings are stored and what happens if you cancel.
That does not help you find today's file. For that, check your email for a link first, then the organizer's Drive, then the trash.
Recordings go to a folder called Meet Recordings inside My Drive in Google Drive. They are not saved to your computer, and they usually land in the meeting organizer's Drive rather than in the Drive of whoever pressed record.
Most often because it is still processing, or because it went to the organizer's Drive instead of yours. Check your email for a link to the file before searching Drive.
It varies with the length of the meeting, and a long call can take longer than the meeting itself. If nothing has appeared after an hour or two, start working through the other reasons.
Recording is tied to the Workspace edition on the account, and personal accounts generally do not have it. If the record option was missing or greyed out, no recording was made.
Check the Drive trash first, since deleted files sit there for a limited period. Once that window passes, or if an administrator's retention policy removed the file, it cannot be recovered.
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