Meeting notes are most useful when they're written during a meeting and easy to find afterward. Microsoft Teams lets you write notes during a meeting and access them from the meeting appointment at any time in the future.

Not every meeting requires notes to be kept, but if you're making decisions, assigning tasks, or working on something particularly important, taking meeting notes is just good practice. Ideally, meeting notes are written during the meeting, are available for all participants to edit, and are easy to find afterward.

The meeting notes functionality in Teams fulfills all of these criteria and is easy to use. Here's how to start using it.

Meeting notes are a default part of any Teams meeting and are attached to the meeting itself. To find them, double-click on the meeting (or click on the meeting and then click "Edit") in the Teams calendar.

The "Edit" button for a Teams meeting.

The meeting notes are on a tab at the top of the meeting.

The "Meeting notes" tab at the top of a meeting.

Once the meeting starts, notes can also be accessed by clicking the three-dot menu icon at the top of the meeting window and then selecting "Meeting Notes."

The "Meeting notes" option in a meeting.

Whichever way you access the notes, the functionality is the same. To start taking notes, click the "Take Notes" button.

The "Take notes" button.

A notification will appear in the meeting chat to let all the participants know that meeting notes are being taken.

The message in the meeting chat telling participants that notes are being taken.

Anyone in the meeting---including external guests---can click "Show notes in fullscreen" and read the notes in real-time. Only people in your organization can start taking notes or edit existing notes.

The meeting notes use Teams's built-in wiki functionality, providing sections, headings, and a toolbar for formatting text.

An example of some meeting notes.

If you haven't used the Microsoft Teams built-in wiki yet, it's an intuitive system that's easy to pick up. Just write your notes during a meeting and format them later if necessary.

The meeting notes will persist across recurring meetings, with a new section automatically created for each meeting. The notes (and the meeting details) will be available in the meeting chat for as long as you keep the meeting in your calendar.