Turning a recorded lecture, interview or meeting into text takes a few minutes with today’s speech recognition. The tool matters less than people think; the recording and a quick review matter more.
Before you upload
- Sound quality wins. A phone close to the speaker beats an expensive mic across the room. Background music and echo hurt accuracy the most.
- Set the right spoken language. The wrong language gives unusable text.
- Video or audio both work. You can upload the MP4 from the meeting or just the MP3/M4A.
Which format to download
- TXT: plain text to read, search or paste into notes.
- SRT or VTT: text with timecodes, useful for quotes (“at 12:40 she says…”) and for captions on the video.
Free options
- YouTube auto captions: upload as unlisted, wait, then download the captions. Free, slower, limited languages for download.
- Whisper on your computer: very good and free if you have a decent GPU and don’t mind the setup.
Online, in a few minutes
Upload the file to our video transcription page (or audio to SRT for audio files), choose the spoken language and download TXT, SRT or VTT. 60+ spoken languages, optional translation into 80+ languages, free minutes when you verify your email, then pay per minute with no subscription. Try it on 5 minutes of your own recording first to judge the accuracy.
Review it once
Even the best AI misses names, acronyms and technical terms. Read the transcript once with the recording, especially quotes you will publish. Fixing them in the online editor keeps the timings right.