Looking to record system sounds and your microphone at the same time on Ubuntu, and save it to a single audio file?
Reco is a free, open-source audio recording app for Linux, written in Vala and GTK. Although it’s designed for elementary OS it works well on Ubuntu and other Linux distributions, and doesn’t look too conspicuous on the modern GNOME desktop, either.
Better still, Reco is available to install from Flathub.
Reco running in Fedora Workstation 39
Capturing your voice and system’s audio output such as game audio, software sounds, music, and broadcasts simultaneously is a handy tool for content creation. This is beneficial whether you’re conducting interviews for podcasts, making YouTube videos, or transcribing for blog posts and so on.
Individuals partaking in online lectures, seminars, or meetings may also find it advantageous to have an audio copy of the discussions to reference, revise from, or make notes.
To record audio calls on Ubuntu, you can use Reco. It’s worth noting that before beginning the recording, permission should be obtained from the other party. This rule applies even in casual settings like chatting with friends on Discord.
What I find most impressive about Reco is its feature that allows for choosing which microphone to record from. While this might not seem like a major feature, it is very handy if you have various input devices connected and you don’t want to use the one set as the system default.
Features of Reco:
- Record sounds from microphone and system at the same time
- Choose which device(s) to record from
- Save to FLAC, MP3, Ogg, Opus, WAV
- Set a delay before recording (up to 15 seconds)
- Set total length of recording (up to 600 seconds)
- Audio waveform shown during recording
- Choose to auto save recordings or choose location each time
- Recording saved if app is quit
If Reco sounds useful to you, go give it a whirl.