Founders seats

Your own Gemini key

Run meetings on your own Google Gemini API key: which plans allow it, how to get and add a key, and how it is protected.

On Pro, Max and the Founders licence, Meeting Ears can run on your own Google Gemini API key. Google then bills you for the AI directly, and those meetings use none of your live time or AI allowance.

Early access

Running meetings on your own key is new and still being tested end to end. If something doesn’t work on your key, remove it and the service’s hours are used again.

When your key is used

  • Pro: once the month’s 12 hours are used up, so your meetings keep going.
  • Max and Founders: any time.
  • Fair use applies: up to 200 hours a month on your key, and the daily limits of every plan.
  • The passes and the trial don’t include an own key; the key field says so.

Get a Gemini API key

  1. Go to Google AI Studio (aistudio.google.com) and sign in with your Google account.
  2. Choose Get API key and create a key, in a new or existing Google Cloud project.
  3. Set up billing for that project. Without billing, Google’s free tier limits are too low for a meeting, and Google’s terms for unpaid use allow it to use your content to improve its products.
  4. Copy the key. It starts with AIza.

Add it to Meeting Ears

  1. Open Settings → Account → Your own Gemini key.
  2. Paste the key into Gemini API key and press Save key. The service checks it with Google first (“Checking the key with Google…”).
  3. From then on the app shows only “Key ending” and its last four characters. Replace the key or Remove at any time.

What the key is used for

When a meeting runs on your key, the service uses it for that meeting’s AI work: the live transcript, answers, prep briefs and translations. The audio and text still pass through the Meeting Ears service, which sends them to Google’s Gemini API under your key. Google’s terms for your API account apply to that use.

How the key is protected

  • The key is sent once from the app to the service and stored only in encrypted form: each key is sealed with its own data key, which is itself encrypted by a key held in Google Cloud KMS and bound to your account.
  • It is never shown again, never written to logs, and never sent back to the app.
  • Remove deletes it from the service. You can also delete or restrict the key in Google AI Studio at any time.