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If you search Microsoft Teams bot open source, you’ll find GitHub repositories you can download and run. Many of them are genuinely useful, especially for internal tools and prototypes.
The key question is how the bot connects to the meeting, because that determines what setup is required and what breaks over time.
The two ways open source Microsoft Teams meeting bots typically work
1. Join the meeting like a human (Microsoft Teams web client automation)
Many open source bots work by launching a browser, logging into the Microsoft Teams web client, and joining the meeting like a normal participant. Once inside, they usually enable live captions and extract transcript text from the page.
This approach is popular because it’s runnable with minimal Microsoft-specific setup, and it’s easy to understand.
The tradeoff is that it depends on the Microsoft Teams web UI. If Microsoft changes the join flow, button labels, or caption structure, the bot may need updates. Captions can also be disabled depending on organization settings.
2. Use Microsoft’s official calling APIs (Graph real-time media bot)
Other projects take the supported path: the bot connects to Microsoft Teams using Microsoft’s official calling APIs and receives meeting audio directly.
To do this, you need to set up an “app registration” in Azure, which is basically how Microsoft issues credentials and permissions for applications. You also typically need an IT admin to approve the app and grant access to real-time meeting media.
This approach is more stable long-term because it’s based on supported APIs rather than UI scraping, but the setup is heavier and the infrastructure requirements are higher.
What it means to self-host a Micorsoft Teams meeting bot
Open source repos can get you to a working bot quickly, but running one reliably is usually where the real effort shows up.
In practice, self-hosting means you’re responsible for things like:
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keeping the bot running across Microsoft Teams UI changes or API changes
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handling login/security issues (MFA, conditional access, session expiry)
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scaling bots to handle multiple meetings at once
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monitoring and debugging failures when meetings produce no transcript or audio
The ongoing ownership takes engineering time.
When open source works well
Open source Microsoft Teams bots are reasonable when you control the environment, like internal meetings in a known tenant with predictable settings. Even in such settings, there are risks when Microsoft makes changes to the DOM.
When you need consistent behavior across many organizations, where admin policies and meeting settings can vary widely, often choosing a third-party meeting infrastructure provider to access a Microsoft Teams meeting bot API, Microsoft Teams recording API, or a Microsoft Teams transcription API is the best solution due to reliability that extends beyond the happy path.
If you want to build it yourself
If you're committed to building a Microsoft Teams bot yourself. A step-by-step guide like our guide on how to build a Microsoft Teams bot can help you understand the moving parts before you commit to a solution.
Final thoughts
Yes, Microsoft Teams bot open source projects exist and some easy to spin up.
The decision to use open source software is less about whether it works, which is easy to validate, and more about whether you want to own the ongoing maintenance and operational responsibility of running meeting infrastructure long term. For many businesses evaluating open source recording software, meeting infrastructure is core to their product. In those cases, reliability and operational overhead should be central to the build-vs-buy decision.
