Not legal advice. This site is an editorial reference. Laws change — always confirm with a qualified attorney in the relevant jurisdiction before recording, and check each page’s last reviewed date.

iPhone Call Recorders Compared

iPhone’s closed call audio means every iPhone recorder uses a three-way conference bridge or a workaround. We tested the five most-installed apps. TapeACall has the best audio. Rev has the best free tier.

What we tested

Five iPhone call-recording apps actively maintained on the US App Store as of the review date: TapeACall, Rev Call Recorder, Cube Call Recorder ACR, Call Recorder Pro by Bahaa Aboukhadra, and Automatic Call Recorder by Appliqato. All five were tested on iPhone 15 running iOS 18, on the same Wi-Fi connection, calling the same reference numbers, over a two-week period.

Method

Each app was used to record five outgoing calls and five incoming calls to a reference line. We captured: audio quality of each leg, whether the other party heard any announcement, whether the file was retrievable and exportable, and what the published retention policy looked like. See our full testing methodology.

Results

TapeACall

The category leader. Audio is clearest of the five tested. The three-way bridge plays a brief tone on outgoing calls; some users perceive this as a recording notice, others do not. File export to mp3 is reliable. Annual subscription. See our full TapeACall review.

Rev Call Recorder

Free for recording, paid for transcription. Audio quality good. Three-way method similar to TapeACall but with no announcement on outbound. Files exportable. See our full Rev review.

Cube Call Recorder ACR

VoIP call recording (works for some VoIP apps, not for cellular calls directly). Audio quality varies by source. Free tier limited; paid tier removes limit.

Call Recorder Pro

Three-way bridge approach. Audio quality acceptable. Interface is dated. Free trial then paid.

Automatic Call Recorder

Three-way bridge. Audio quality acceptable. Cheaper than TapeACall but with fewer features.

Comparison table (summary)

Audio quality, in our test:

  1. TapeACall (best)
  2. Rev Call Recorder
  3. Automatic Call Recorder
  4. Call Recorder Pro
  5. Cube ACR (when applicable)

Cost: Rev (free for recording) and Cube’s free tier are the cheapest options; TapeACall, Automatic, and Call Recorder Pro are subscription-based.

Legality of method: all five rely on a three-way conference bridge, which is a recognized one-party-consent-compatible method under federal law. None of them helps with all-party-consent states; in those states, you still need to obtain consent verbally at the start of the call.

Alternatives

  • Google Voice for iPhone — free, announces verbally, incoming calls only.
  • Hardware recorder with a Lightning audio interface for archival quality.
  • Speakerphone-plus-second-device for one-off recordings.

No affiliate relationship with any product mentioned on this page. See our editorial policy for the full disclosure stance.

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