Well we can’t answer that for you (exactly) but we can review and compare them using Episode 166 as the common sound file. The goal was to answer (or try too anyways) the often asked question – what service should I use to transcribe my podcasts?

There are however many caveats which we cover during the episode, such as:

• How many speakers do you have?
• Do you have accents?
• Do you need a vocabulary built in?
• What is your budget?
• How long are your episodes?
• How often do you record/publish?
• What is your required turn around time?
• Do you want to do any editing?
• Do you care if it is perfect?
• And many more!

So just keep in mind that the tests below are based on a single 17 minute file with 2 speakers. Your mileage may vary with each service depending on how you answer any of the above questions. Or what I am trying to say is – use this episode and our transcription service research to help you validate or shorten your final list.

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Transcription by Human vs. Transcription by AI

So which is better? Human transcription is likely going to be more accurate today but also much more expensive. Based on the services we looked at AI can run from $.40 to $5 or so to transcribe a 20 minute audio file. The services that have humans transcribe ranged from $20 to $30 for the same file. While we didn’t compare AI vs. Human for this test from what Dave has seen, human transcriptions are much closer to 99.99% correct mark than the AI options are – for now.

So in the end your options are:

• Be cheap and use AI.
• Go for accuracy and use a human service.
• Be cheap and use AI but spend time editing it after the fact.

With that said we mostly looked at AI services but did include some often mentioned and popular human transcription service options too in the review section.

Transcription Service Scores

Regarding the scores, here is some quick background on each column.

• Ease of Use – Is it easy to setup and use? Is it fast? Does it work?
• Features – Does it have integrations (Zoom, Zapier, etc.)? Does it have export options? Can I get in there and edit if needed?
• Speaker Handling – Does the service label speakers? Seems simple but many failed.
• Transcription – I looked at 4 different clips and compared to what was really said and to the other services. If major issues were noticed they lost .5 or 1 point per.

Transcription Service Reviews

The reviews were done by Dave over the period of 1-2 weeks in August/September of 2020. All pricing, features and such are based on what was available on the sites, apps and such at that time.

Descript (Score: 7.75)

• Free Option – 3 hours of transcription (one time)
• $12 a month gets you 10 hours of monthly transcription

Descript is a bit different as it is an APP that you have to download. Also to be fair it is what we currently use for our transcripts so note that I am more familiar with the program than a newb. Once you download and get setup the Descript App is pretty easy to use. I simply create a new Composition in my usual folder, move the file in and let it go to work. I set assign speakers and once it is done it lets you assign the various voices to a person and then updates everything. The result is usually 100% match on speakers, even if 3 or 4 people it seems to work. Only once in some 100 or so episodes have I had issues with the speaker assignment. The output is clean and simple and overall I do love the app and price. That said it will be interesting to compare the quality of the output to others finally.

Otter AI (Score: 7.00)

• Free Option – 600 minutes a month (max 40 minute file)
• $8.33 a month gets you 6000 minutes a month (max 4 hour file)

Otter has a simple signup with the usual email verification. Out of the gate you can upload 3 files and get 600 minutes even if you don’t sign up for a plan. At the free level the integrations are limited but if you upgrade Zoom and Dropbox become available – no Zapier however. There is also a Manage Vocabulary – only 5 words with free but again if you upgrade you can have 200. So for those with technical terms, industry terms or difficult last names this again can help improve the accuracy. One interesting feature that others don’t seem to have is contacts and calendar integration. Included below is a screen shot of the app pushing to help you tie into your meetings and basically be a note taker for you. Lastly the export is somewhat limited compared to other tools. If you are free you are very limited but even if paying the options are lagging other tools. The processing also took much longer than any other solution when you factor in that it has to process, then while working I assigned speakers and then it finished the transcription but still took awhile to assign speakers. So for a 16 or so minute file and compared to other AI tools it was the slowest.

Microsoft Word (Score: 6.50)

• Price: Free with online 365 office suite

I think the hardest part of using this solution was realizing that it isn’t in Word on my laptop but rather only available in the browser version of Word for Office 365. So if you have Edge browser or Chrome and can log into your 365 Office account you can use this tool. As far as the use and output, both are really straight forward and simple. I just selected a file, waited and then boom its done. You can then edit as needed in a Word doc in the browser or locally after you export. A bonus was that while you cant assign speakers it does list Speaker 1 and Speaker 2 so after a simple Search and Replace you can have speakers assigned – not something most other systems do or allow oddly.

Temi (Score: 6.50)

• $0.25 a minute

So Temi is by far one of the easier solutions to get started with we used. Right on the homepage they let you upload a file and then ask for your email and go right to work. For a lead generator but also making it fast and easy to test their service they might be the best. The interface once you get your file is really simple. You can do some edits, change speakers (I had to change one early on that the AI got wrong) and can have it edit out uhs and ums. Export has some options to do the same and all in all is really fast and simple.

Audext (Score: 5.25)

• Hourly – $10.90-13.00 per hour. Plans $8.99-12.00 with more savings if go annual.

I was able to sign up but the email – never came. I checked JUNK as it kept suggesting but never saw it. I then tried other email addresses in an attempt to just start over. Too late, my IP address was now attached to the account I couldn’t get into or recover. I cleared cookies and changed my IP and was able to finally get in using a GMAIL account. Then my troubles continued. I tried to upload a file and it simply took forever. Eventually it timed out and I hit back and tried again. Timed out again. I did this 5 times and I guess it DID work ev