Transcribing business meetings or interviews can take a long time, and if you employ a human to do the task, it can be expensive. That’s where machine-powered transcription services can help. Otter’s automated transcription service is free and fast. Otter also has excellent mobile apps and fast file processing. That said, Otter produced error-filled transcriptions in testing, though the fine editing software Otter offers goes some way to negating that drawback. If you’re looking for a free or low-cost transcription service for simple audio or video recordings, Otter is a reliable choice. We recommend Editors’ Choice winner Rev, a human-powered service, for more complex transcription jobs.
How Much Does Otter Cost?
For individual users, Otter offers both free and paid plans. The Basic plan is free and includes 600 minutes of transcriptions per month and caps each transcription at 40 minutes. The free plan also limits the number of files you can import to three and the number of custom vocabulary words you can designate to five.
The paid Pro plan is $12.99 per month, includes 6,000 minutes of transcriptions per month, and caps transcription files and recording at 4 hours. There is no limit on the number of files you can import, and you can designate up to 200 custom names and 200 other terms with this plan. For all paid plans, you get a discount for paying annually instead of monthly.
For organizations and teams, Otter offers a Business plan at $30 per month and an Enterprise plan that requires contact with the company to set a price. A Business account includes all the Pro features and Otter Assistant, an app that automatically joins any Zoom or Microsoft Teams meeting to record, transcribe, and share meeting notes with the participants.
For individuals rather than businesses, Otter is far less expensive than Trint, another fully automated transcription service, which starts at $60 per month for a Starter plan. Other transcription services tend to favor the pay-as-you-go model over a monthly subscription fee. For example, Temi charges $0.25 per audio minute. Sonix starts at $10 per hour for its automated transcription services though it also has a subscription plan for $22 per month.
Human-powered transcription services tend to cost a little more, but the transcriptions also tend to be more accurate. For example, TranscriptionPanda starts at $0.95 per audio minute for final-draft-worthy transcriptions. After that, the price bumps up for faster turnaround times, timestamps, complex audio, verbatim transcriptions, and translation services.
How Otter Works
According to a company contact, Otter uses AI natural language processing technology for its automated transcription. The speech-to-text engine processes the English language, and the speaker identification algorithm learns who is speaking and when in real-time. Otter automatically ignores filler words such as “um,” “hm,” and “uh.” It won’t even recognize them when added to a custom vocabulary in the app.
You can train Otter to recognize your voice so it will always tag your name within a transcript. Otter calls this your voiceprint, which is your unique set of speech characteristics. To create your own voiceprint, click your name in the top left corner of the home screen on the web version of the app, then go to Account settings, then My voiceprint. Otter can also learn jargon, names, and other vocabulary words. You can manage your custom vocabulary words by visiting the Account Settings page.
Otter’s automatic speech recognition technology is similar to that of a few other automated services we reviewed, including Scribie, Temi, and Trint. Of those competitors, Trint is the only one with a vocabulary-building function like Otter’s.
File Support and Security
Otter users can import audio or video files. Supported formats include AAC, AVIm M4A, MOV, MPEG, MP4, WMA, and WMV. In addition, Pro and Business plan users can export files as DOCX, MP3, PDF, SRT, and TXT. Free plan users are limited to exporting as MP3 or TXT files.
Trint has Players, which stitch together transcripts to video to present them, karaoke-style, with closed captions. You can embed these videos on your website, and the text is recognized by search engines. Unfortunately, Otter does not offer this feature. Pro and Enterprise users can export SRT files that can be used to create closed captions on YouTube videos, however.
Security with automated transcription services is tight because humans aren’t involved in the transcription process. Otter’s privacy policy details how Otter collects and uses your data, including its relationship with third-party advertisers and law enforcement agencies—read it carefully if you plan to do any sensitive transcriptions. The Privacy policy states that you can erase or delete your files at any time and object to and restrict the processing of your personal information.
Otter does not allow individual users to set up multi-factor authentication, which is baffling and disappointing. Business and Enterprise users can set up multi-factor authentication on their accounts. Services that host potentially private or sensitive information should offer this security feature by default.
Otter’s Mobile Interface
Otter offers Android and iOS apps. You can download the app from either app store and create an account. I installed the app on an iPhone running iOS 14 for this review.
The app’s primary interface is dark blue and white. The iPhone app looks clean, professional, and modern.
You navigate the app by tapping links on the left panel. Those links include, in order, Home, My Agenda, My Conversations, Shared with Me, Groups, and Folders. You can also view all your recordings by tapping All Conversations and find discarded recordings by going to Trash. Finally, tapping the hamburger menu at the top left takes you back to the primary navigation panel.
The My Conversations section lists all your recordings in reverse chronological order, both from the web app and mobile apps. You can search for terms within the transcripts by tapping the magnifying glass icon. You can also sort a recording into a folder, export it, or share it by pressing and holding the link to the Conversation. Trint also offers the option to arrange recordings into folders.
A single tap on a Conversation brings up the editing mode. There you can add names for speakers, edit the transcript, and play back the audio to aid in your editing process. Making changes to transcripts with Otter’s app is intuitive.
The Groups tab within the primary panel lets you organize your contacts so you can share recordings. Otter makes it easy to collaborate and share with anyone, even non-Otter users, via the app. You can share a link to the recording from the app, just as you can with Trint.
The live recording feature in the app is where the service should shine brightest, but it comes up short. To test the efficacy of the real-time transcriptions, I recorded myself speaking slowly. The live translations were able to keep up well with my short speech, and the resulting transcription was error-free. I then recorded myself reading from a script at a normal, conversational speaking speed, and the real-time transcription struggled to keep up. The finished transcription was unusable because it contained many errors. It’s an excellent idea and acceptable for very slow, well-prepared speeches, but the technology can’t keep up if you’re trying to record meetings or notes on the go.
Otter’s speech-to-text function is on par with other company’s offerings in the sector. I read the same slow, short speech I referenced above while using the Google Docs Voice typing feature on my computer, and like Otter, it produced a readable, usable document. When I began speaking at a normal, conversational speed, Docs struggled to keep up and made many errors, also like Otter. With more refinement, Otter’s speech-to-text for mobile devices could be a game-changer when it comes to taking notes or transcribing meetings and interviews in real-time.
Otter on the Web
Otter’s web interface looks similar to its mobile apps, with a dark blue and white color scheme. There are five links along the left panel: Home, My Agenda, My Conversations, Shared with Me, and Apps. My Agenda connects to your calendar events. You can set up recordings for Google Meet using the Otter Chrome Extension or with the Otter Assistant for Microsoft Teams and Zoom to record and transcribe audio from your meetings.
My Conversations is where all your recordings live. Selecting a file opens it, and you can edit the transcript. You can search for specific terms in the transcription using the search bar. You can also move transcriptions to different folders and export and share files from the editing screen.
An exciting feature is keyboard shortcuts for editing. You can use the specified shortcuts to pause, rewind, slow down, and speed up the audio while you’re editing a transcript. The editing shortcuts are handy tools I haven’t seen in other transcription services.
How Accurate Is Otter?
It’s a good thing Otter’s editing features are advanced because the raw transcribing power of the AI produced many errors in testing.
I use the same two 5-minute recordings to test the accuracy of all transcription services. First is a simple audio test, which is a recording of a two-person podcast taken in a home studio with prosumer-level audio equipment. There is minimal cross talk and both speakers are native English speakers with American accents. The simple test audio is for automated transcription services only.
Next is a complex audio test, which is a three-person sports podcast recorded with professional-level microphones. There’s a lot of cross talk, slang, and sports jargon. It’s a challenging recording, but all the voices are audible. I use the complex test audio for both automated and human-based transcription services.
I mark an error for each test whenever there is an incorrect word, a missing or extra word, or a speaker misidentified in the text. Unfortunately, Otter’s performance in the simple audio test produced below-average results. It didn’t take the service long to transcribe the file, but the finished transcription had 18 errors. Only two other automated transcription services, Temi and Scribie, performed worse on the simple audio test.
Otter produced 42 errors in the complex audio test after processing the file for just one minute and 41 seconds. The errors created an unusable transcription file that required a lot of editing.
Transcribe Wherever You Go
Otter’s transcription service is fast and easy to use, with well-designed mobile and web apps and intuitive editing features. It’s excellent for transcribing simple, slow speech, or for when you have plenty of time to go back and edit long transcripts on a budget. The integration with business tools like calendars and meeting software is commendable, but the resulting transcriptions aren’t accurate enough to be usable.
Otter’s free subscription plan is appealing if you’re looking for low-cost transcribing, but we recommend human-powered transcription services for complex audio and video. Editors’ Choice pick Rev is more expensive than Otter but it creates more accurate transcriptions with a short turnaround time.
