Two-Party Consent States: The Full List

About a dozen states require all-party consent to record a conversation, meaning everyone in the conversation must agree first. The clearest examples are California, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Washington.

The rest of the country, and federal law, follow one-party consent, where a single participant can authorize the recording. This page lists every all-party state, cites the governing statute, and flags the states with mixed rules.

This is general information, not legal advice. Consult qualified counsel about recording in your jurisdiction, and verify each statute at the primary source before you rely on it.

One-party vs. All-party Consent, in One Minute

One-party consent means the recording is legal if at least one participant agrees, and that participant can be you. All-party consent means every participant must be informed and must agree before recording.

Federal law sets a one-party floor under the Wiretap Act at 18 U.S.C. § 2511. States may require more protection, and the states below do. The term two-party consent is common shorthand, but the real rule is all-party: with five people on a call, all five must consent.

When participants sit in different states, the strictest applicable law can control. If anyone is in an all-party state, get consent from everyone.

The Clear All-party Consent States

These nine states require all-party consent across the core recording situations. Statutes still contain exceptions, so treat each citation as a starting point and confirm the current text.

• California: Penal Code § 632. All-party consent for confidential communications, in person or by phone. The heart of the California Invasion of Privacy Act.
• Florida: Fla. Stat. § 934.03. All-party consent where a participant reasonably expects privacy.
• Illinois: 720 ILCS 5/14-2. All-party for private conversations, with broad exceptions for recording public officials and police in public.
• Maryland: Md. Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 10-402. All-party consent, tied to a reasonable expectation of privacy.
• Massachusetts: Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 272 § 99. Bans secret recording, with no confidentiality requirement; even open recording without consent can violate it.
• Montana: Mont. Code Ann. § 45-8-213. Requires notification to all parties.
• New Hampshire: N.H. Rev. Stat. § 570-A:2. All-party consent; unlawful interception can be a felony.
• Pennsylvania: 18 Pa. Cons. Stat. §§ 5703-5704. All-party consent; unauthorized interception can be a felony.
• Washington: Wash. Rev. Code § 9.73.030. All-party consent; a clear recorded announcement can satisfy it.

The Mixed and Nuanced States

Four more states apply all-party rules in some situations and one-party rules in others. They are commonly listed with the all-party states, but the rule depends on whether the conversation is in person or over the phone.

Read these carefully before you rely on them. The safest practice is to treat them as all-party whenever any participant could reasonably expect privacy.

• Connecticut: Conn. Gen. Stat. § 52-570d. A civil statute requires all-party consent to record telephone calls; in-person criminal eavesdropping is one-party.
• Oregon: Or. Rev. Stat. § 165.540. All-party consent for in-person conversations, but one-party for telephone and electronic communications.
• Nevada: Nev. Rev. Stat. §§ 200.620 and 200.650. All-party for telephone calls; the in-person statute reads one-party but courts have added a privacy gloss, so treat it as all-party to be safe.
• Michigan: Mich. Comp. Laws § 750.539c. The statute reads as all-party, but courts have held that a participant may record their own conversation, so in practice it often functions as one-party.

Everywhere Else Is One-party Consent

The remaining states and the District of Columbia follow one-party consent, matching the federal floor. A single participant can authorize recording a conversation they are part of.

One-party consent does not make every recording legal. Federal law still bars recording done to commit a crime or a tort, and other laws, such as those covering privacy or wiretapping of people you are not talking to, still apply.

The practical rule for multi-state calls is simple. Map your participants, and if even one sits in an all-party or mixed state, get consent from all of them.

How to Use This List Safely

Statute citations move and change. Legislatures amend recording laws, and courts reinterpret them, so a citation that is right today can shift. Always open the primary source and read the current text before you rely on it.

The consent map also depends on facts this list cannot capture. Whether a conversation is confidential, whether a participant reasonably expected privacy, and whether an exception applies all turn on details specific to your call.

For a business recording across many states, the reliable posture is to default to all-party consent everywhere. It is one rule to train, it survives a participant traveling, and it removes the guesswork of mapping each person to a jurisdiction.

• Verify each statute at its primary source before relying on it.
• Consent outcomes depend on privacy expectations and exceptions.
• Default to all-party consent to keep one simple rule.

What This Means for AI Note-takers

AI note-takers record and transcribe meetings, so all-party consent laws apply to them exactly as they apply to a person hitting record. The automation does not create an exception.

The risk is sharpest when a tool captures silently. Tools like Granola, Otter, Fireflies, and Fathom vary in whether they send a visible bot into the call. On-device, no-bot capture makes it harder to prove every participant was notified, which matters most in all-party states.

The stakes are being tested in court. A putative class action, Chamberlain v. Granola, Inc., filed in the Northern District of California in July 2026, alleges the tool recorded conversations and used them to train AI models by default. The complaint is early-stage and unproven, with parallel suits against Otter.ai and Fireflies.ai. If your meetings include anyone in an all-party state, give clear notice and get consent before the AI records.

The safest habit is to make notice automatic. Add a recording line to invites, keep a visible banner on during capture, and confirm consent aloud on calls with outside participants. That routine works no matter which state's law applies.

• All-party consent laws apply to AI capture, not just human recording.
• Silent, no-bot capture makes proving notice harder.
• Notify and get consent from every participant in all-party states.