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Table of contents:
Key takeaways:
- Audio can be transcribed to text using automatic transcription tools, speech-to-text software, or tools built into other apps like Google Meet. It can also be done manually.
- Manual transcription can be time-consuming and expensive, but is necessary in some applications.
- For automatic transcription, try Riverside. It transcribes in 100+ languages with up to 99% accuracy, and provides other tools like speaker differentiation.
- There are lots of great transcription apps available, depending on your needs, including Otter.ai, Microsoft Word, Rev Voice Recorder, and Riverside.
Need a transcript of a call, meeting, webinar, or podcast?
It’s easier than ever, thanks to a range of great tools. Whether you're transcribing in real time or uploading a recording afterward, we'll walk you through how to turn audio into text and highlight the best options out there.
Let’s dive in!
How to transcribe audio to text: 4 methods
How to transcribe audio to text depends on the tool you decide to use. Here are the key options to be aware of:
- Automatic transcription tools: AI-powered tools that make transcription easy. Just upload a recording or speak into your mic and they will transcribe your content accurately and quickly, with minimal fuss.
- Manual transcription: Transcribed by a human - whether it’s you or a hired professional. While typically very accurate, this method can be time-consuming and sometimes costly.
- Speech-to-text software: Software designed for real-time transcription, often focused on dictation. It works pretty well for dictation, but lacks a lot of the higher-level features AI-powered tools offer.
Tools built into other apps: Tools like Zoom, Teams, Notion, and Google Meet include transcription features, and these can be handy when using these apps. Because they aren’t dedicated transcription tools, though, their flex quality of their output can vary.
How to transcribe audio automatically online
Ready to start transcribing the easy way? AI-powered, automatic transcription using online tools is your best bet. With Riverside, you can record and transcribe podcasts, webinars, video calls, and more quickly and easily. Here’s how:
Step 1: Sign up or log in to Riverside.
Step 2: Start recording immediately by clicking “Record.” You can also opt to plan your recording for later by clicking “Plan.”
Step 3: Select your mic and camera, and whether you are using headphones. Then click “Join Studio.”
Step 4: Invite other participants to join your studio by sending them a link or inviting them by email. (Note that you can also do this in advance of your scheduled call).
Step 5: When everyone has entered the studio, click the red “Record” button. After a short countdown, the recording will begin.
Step 6: Conduct your event as usual. Riverside will record your audio (and, if you like, video), and transcribe as you speak.
Step 7: Click “Stop” to end the recording when you’re done. Click “View recordings.”
Step 8: Now you have two options. You can:
- Click “Edit” or “View transcript” to go to the Editor and use your transcript to edit your content using text-based editing.
- Click “Recording Files” to download your transcript as a TXT or SRT file.
And that’s it! Riverside’s automatic transcription is as easy as any video call. The only difference is, you get professional quality audio and video and a downloadable transcript that includes speaker differentiation. You’ll also get access to Riverside’s suite of editing tools, so you can edit your audio to a more professional standard.
How to transcribe audio to text manually
Transcribing text manually has some benefits. It can be really accurate, even when there is overlapping speech, strong accents, or background noise. It’s also required in some industries due to privacy or other regulations. The downside is that if you do it yourself, it’s a slog. And if you pay someone else to do it, it could be a significant expense. Either way, it’ll take way more time. Here’s what the process looks like:
Step 1: Listen to the recording all the way through to get a sense of the different speakers, content, and context of the conversation.
Step 2: Start the recording again to begin transcribing what you hear. Pause or rewind as often as necessary to keep up with what is being said and clarify potentially challenging areas. You can also opt to add time stamps at regular intervals or before key sections.
Step 3: Once you’ve transcribed the entire text, go through and listen again. Follow along in your transcript to make sure it accurately reflects the spoken audio.
Step 4: Edit your transcript to clean up grammar and punctuation. Depending on your transcription style, you might also remove filler words and pauses, or adjust wording for clarity. (Some transcripts require 100% accuracy to what was said and how it was said.)
If you opt to hire someone to transcribe your audio to text, it will likely cost you between $1 and $10 per audio minute. Pricing depends on the experience of your transcriber, the type of transcript you require, and whether it needs to be certified for legal or official purposes.
How to transcribe audio to text on your phone
If you’re on the go, you may want to transcribe audio to text on your phone. There are a few apps that you can use to do this, including Google transcription tools like Google Live Transcribe. However, many apps are pretty rudimentary and don’t include things like speaker differentiation and downloadable transcripts. Riverside’s free mobile app allows you to record and transcribe content from anywhere. Here’s how to use it:
Step 1: Open the Riverside app on your mobile device and log in.
Step 2: Tap “Create” to start a new studio.
Step 3: Tap “Record,” then “Join” to enter your studio. You can opt to have your camera on or off here.
Step 4: Invite participants by tapping the person icon in the top right of your screen.
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Step 5: Tap the red button to start your recording.
Step 5: Tap the red button again to stop the recording. If you’re done, tap “Leave” in the top left corner or your screen.
Step 6: Go back to the app’s dashboard, tap on the project you want to edit, then on the “Editor” button.
Step 7: Now you can opt to “Edit” your recording using text-based editing. Your transcript will also make it fast and easy to add captions.
Step 8: You can also opt to “View Transcript.” From here you can copy and paste your transcript, or share it via another app. You can also visit Riverside in your browser and download your transcript in SRT or TXT from there.
The benefits of transcribing your content
Transcribing is easy (with Riverside) but if you’re still wondering whether you should bother, here are some of the key benefits:
Accessibility
Transcription is a great way to make spoken audio accessible to a broader group of people. A transcript can be used to easily create captions and subtitles, allowing those who are hard of hearing to access your content. Plus, some people just learn better by reading; providing a transcript is just another way to get your message across.
SEO
If you’re creating podcasts or YouTube content, a transcript can help boost your podcast SEO (your visibility in search engines and platform discovery engines). Audio content is inaccessible to search engines, so they have to rely on transcripts, hashtags, and other text to understand your content.
Content repurposing
A transcript can make it easier to use your audio and video content as a springboard for other types of content, such as blog posts. It’s often easier to rework an existing text than it is to start from scratch.
Text-based editing
Automated transcription tools (like Riverside!) often provide text-based editing. This allows you to use your transcript to edit your audio and your video by cutting words from the transcript. Easy!
Recordkeeping
If you’re recording meetings, interviews, or internal documentation, a transcript can provide a searchable (and less memory-intensive) way to keep and maintain records.
What is the best transcription tool?
Ready to start transcribing and looking for the best tool to help you do it? There are lots of great options out there, depending on your needs. Here are a few of our favorites:
Riverside
Best for: Podcasts, meetings, webinars, virtual conferences
Riverside is such an easy transcription tool, it’s hard not to use it. It can transcribe in 100+ languages with up to 99% accuracy, including punctuation and speaker differentiation. You can edit your transcript in Riverside’s editor, download it as an SRT or TXT file, or use it to quickly add captions to your content. Plus, you’ll get a whole suite of other tools to ensure your recording is polished and professional.
Key features:
- Highly quality recording - record in up to 4K video and 48 kHz audio (this helps ensure high transcription accuracy.)
- Invite participants with a link - no need to download software.
- AI-powered automatic transcription delivers your transcript as soon as you finish recording.
- Automatic speaker labels help you identify who said what.
- Text-based editing to help you clean up your audio (and video!) as easily as editing a doc.
- Automatic filler word and silence removal - just one click!
- Easy, customizable captions to make your content more accessible.
Google Recorder App
The Google Recorder App is a powerful voice recording and real-time transcription tool. It automatically transcribes audio in real time, allows search through speech, and works completely offline. While it’s only available on Pixel phones, it’s a solid and dependable mobile transcription option. Since it doesn’t support speaker differentiation, we recommend it for single-voice recording only.
Key features:
- Real-time, on-device transcription - no internet required.
- Multi-language support - supports English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, Italian, Hindi, Chinese, and more.
- Edit transcripts and audio directly from the app.
- Speaker labeling sorts out who said what.
Microsoft Word
If you’re using Microsoft Word regularly, its Transcribe feature is an option to consider. You can upload an audio file or record directly into Word. Your content will be transcribed in the Transcribe pane, right beside your Word document. Transcribe will automatically segment audio and label speakers. It can even deliver a time-stamped transcript, although if you’re looking for captions, it won’t provide an SRT file.
Key features:
- Record directly in Word or upload audio or video files for transcription.
- Inline editing allows you to edit transcript text directly to fix typos, replace speaker names, and save changes.
- Insert the full transcript or individual sections into your document, or keep it in the Transcribe pane for reference.
- Audio playback allows you to play or pause the audio from within Word.
Otter.ai
Otter.ai is an AI-driven transcription platform that offers real-time captioning, speaker labeling, and collaboration tools. Its AI enhancements make it a great option for meetings, because it can generate meeting summaries, pull out highlights, and create a list of action items. You can even use AI chat to ask questions about the transcript or generate follow-up emails based on it. The only drawbacks are that language support is limited, and you cannot edit audio or video within this tool.
- Real-time transcription generates a transcript as you speak, and saves it afterward. Can also upload audio.
- Searchable transcripts allow you search by keyword or navigate by timecodes.
- AI chat and meeting agent answers questions and creates follow-up emails. It can even take notes and assign tasks.
- Shareable workspaces allow you to share transcripts, make comments, and create action items directly in the app.
Rev Voice Recorder
This handy app is available for both Android and iOS, and is a favorite of journalists and others capturing interviews, lectures, or meetings. It records in high quality and automatically generates real-time transcripts that are up to 90% accurate. You can even upgrade to human transcription within the platform (for a fee). Best of all Rev Voice Recorder can be integrated with Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet to capture live meetings. But, while it includes in-app collaboration and transcript editing, it has no audio editing capabilities.
Key features:
- High-quality audio recording at up to 48 kHz.
- Live AI or human transcription.
- Collaborative features like highlighting, bookmarking and editing.
- Integrates with Zoom, Meet, and Teams, and offers in-app call recording on iOS.
FAQs about transcribing audio to text
How does audio to text transcription work?
Audio-to-text transcription relies on software that “listens” to speech and converts it into written words. It does this by breaking the sounds into small chunks and analyzing their unique patterns. An AI model aims to recognize sounds and match them to words based on language patterns. A language model then evaluates the likelihood of each word sequence (e.g., “cat sat on the mat” is more likely than “sat cat mat on the”). The decoder combines both models to select the most probable transcription of the speech. Some software also recognizes different speakers, and groups segments based on who is speaking. The software also adds punctuation and spacing to make the output easy to read.
That, of course, is a really simplified view of some pretty complex technology. In a way, it isn’t that different from what a human transcriber does - listens, understands, and converts the audio to text. The only difference is that it happens automatically, and within seconds or minutes!
Can Google transcribe audio to text?
Yes. Google has a number of tools that transcribe audio to text. Depending on your needs, you can find transcription tools in Google Meet, Google Docs, and Google Keep. You can also try dedicated Google transcription tools like Google Live Transcribe and Google Speech-to-Text API.
You can learn more in Google Transcription: 6 Handy Tools That Do It for Free.
Can ChatGPT transcribe audio to text?
Yes, it can. ChatGPT uses OpenAI’s Whisper speech-to-text API to transcribe audio to text. Just drag and drop audio or video files into chat GPT, and it will generate a plain-text transcript. ChatGPT can transcribe in more than 50 languages, but it won’t accept uploads of more than 25 MB, which is typically just a few minutes of high-quality audio. It doesn’t label speakers or format transcripts, so all you’ll get is raw text.
Is there an AI that converts audio to text for free?
Yes, there are a number of AI-powered tools that convert audio to text for free. Google offers a number of free transcription tools, and you can also use apps like Rev Voice Recorder. If you’re looking for an option that is highly accurate, can transcribe in multiple languages, and that provides full editing features, try Riverside.
