Best Free Transcription Software Mac

Dragon Transcription Software
Dictation Software Mac Free
Mac Transcribe Audio To Text
Best Free Transcription Software Mac Free
Dictation Software Mac

Yesterday, I got this email from a reader of this blog. I’ll paraphrase (won’t bore you will the smiles and lols). “Hey Kongo, thanks for all the advice on choosing a transcription headset. What would you recommend as the best transcription software for Mac? Thanks, Maggie.” I replied to her email and I thought I should post the reply on my blog for other transcribers that might be searching for a transcription software to use on their mac computers.

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The best transcription software for Mac must be ideal for its users. The tool needs to have a simple interface, good options for manual transcription or automated transcription, and the ability to transcribe both audio files and video files. It’s also helpful to have a human transcription option. Best Dictation Software For Mac In these reviews, we’ve looked at a combination of offline and online dictation software that can be used on a Mac. Note that web-based voice recognition and voice-to-text recognition apps all require a permanent internet connection in order to work. Express Scribe is professional audio player software for PC or Mac designed to help transcribe audio recordings. Reduce your turn around time using Express Scribe’s audio playback with keyboard hot keys or by installing one of the supported transcribing pedals.

Now, let me be clear. By transcription software, I’m referring to software that’s going to assist you manually transcribe audio/video files. I’m not referring to software that automatically converts speech to text: aka dictation software, voice recognition software, speech recognition software. I prefer to refer to these types of software as dictation software.

And since we’ve digressed, let me share with you my 2 cents on dictation software. The accuracy of dictation software is poor – on average about 60%. Accuracy improves with good quality, single speaker audio. If you’re looking for a dictation software to automatically convert your audio to text, I’d recommend you don’t buy software that’s not cloud based.

Here’s why, speech recognition algorithms improve every day (machine learning etc). And you’ll not be able to take advantage of these improvements with an offline software (for instance Dragon Dictate). I’ve tried a few cloud based dictation services and they’re not bad – I got 90% accuracy on a YouTube video transcript. Most use either IBM Watson or Google Speech API.

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Anyway, transcription software are meant for those of us who want to get a software that’s going to assist the manually transcription (= type out the text using our fingers and sometimes our feet!) of audio/video files. To reiterate, the main advantage of a transcription software over a normal audio/video media player is the ability to control audio/video playback.

Here were my requirements when I was searching for transcription software for my Macbook Air. 1) Easy configurable transcription controls. 2) Support video and audio of various formats and codecs. 3) Timestamp Support. 4) USB foot pedal support. Grab a cup of coffee and let’s look at each one of these in depth.

Key Features of a Good Mac Transcription Software

Configurable Transcription Controls

Any transcription software worth its salt supports keyboard hotkeys. And they are easily configurable. But the really good ones support global hotkeys. Which means that you are not restricted to typing on the word processing plane provided with the transcription software. Thus, you can transcribe into any word processor of your choice (Pages, Word etc) and the transcription hotkeys will work. And the advantages of using a dedicated word processor are numerous (spell check!).

Support Various Audio and Video Formats

As a transcriber, you do want to get a transcription software that supports a wide range of audio and video (very useful for slideshow videos) formats. For me, this is not usually a deal breaker because I can’t expect a transcription software to support all audio and video formats – and there is a lot of them. But a transcription software for mac must support .mp4 video format and .m4v/.m4a/.mp3/.mpg audio files. I have a dedicated audio and video converter that converts audio files to .mp3 files. And the .mp3 format work well on most mac transcription software.

Timestamp Support

A lot of my clients ask for timestamps/timecodes to be inserted into the transcripts. Timestamps make it easier for them to refer back to the video or audio. And if they’re using the transcripts to create a paper edit for a documentary project, timecoded transcripts provide the easiest and most efficient way to get a handle on a large block of video footage.

So, timecode support is a must. But again, this is a feature that is not very well supported in any of the mac transcription software. They usually do support it on their word processing plane, but getting the timecode to Pages or Word is challenging. There are workarounds that I’ll share with you.

USB Foot Pedal Support

Again, most mac transcription software support USB foot pedals. However, compatibility is an issue and it’s not guaranteed. Having said that, I own the Infinity IN-USB-1 and I’ve yet to come across a mac transcription software that does not support it.

Having gone through the 4 basic requirements for a mac transcription software, you really have only 2 choices: F5 or Express Scribe. InqScribe is a good transcription software, but it doesn’t support global hotkeys, which is a real shame. If you’re okay transcribing into their word processor, you can try it out. All other mac transcription software I found were very old versions (5 years) and were no longer actively supported.

Best Transcription Software for Mac

I really like F5 and I use it exclusively to transcribe on my mac. It’s checks all the boxes and is perfect for my transcription needs. A while back it used to be free (as in beer), but that’s no longer the case. To be honest, I find their pricing model to be complicated. There’s a free version of F5 – which only allows you to transcribe the first 10 minutes of a video/audio file. A standard version, unlimited transcription (you can transcribe any length of audio/video file) but no USB pedal support, no waveform, memos and auto speaker changing. I recommend you get the pro version, mainly because of the USB pedal support (not sure why this is not in the standard version), and you’ll need a foot pedal (here are 3 I recommend) to play and pause F5 in the background.

My other gripe with F5 is inserting timestamps into my transcripts. It’s easy enough when you’re transcribing into the F5 word processor – just press F8. Which reminds me. You’ll need to activate the F keys under System Preferences > Keyboard, for them to work on your Mac.

Anyway, back to inserting timestamps, there is no easy way to insert timestamps into Pages. You’ll have 2 options. Option 1 is switch to the F5 window, CMD + T (to generate the timestamp),and copy and paste the timestamp to Pages. Works, but as you can imagine, if you want to insert timestamps every 30 seconds, it’s a lot of work going back and forth between the F5 and Pages. The second option is write an apple script or use Keyboard Maestro to record a macro. I’d recommend keyboard maestro – very easy to use (~~if you want me to create a short how to video let me know in the comments section below)~~. Here’s a link to the video – I don’t know why, but I ramble a lot in this video; bear with me.

I do know my way around code, so I have an apple script that I use to insert timestamps into my transcripts with one keyboard stroke. Other than that, F5 is simply great. I get better audio quality using F5, and it’s really very easy to use and customize. Definitely the best transcription software for mac. Download from Mac App Store.

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Express Scribe Pro

Where to begin with Express Scribe. Some people love it, others hate it. Personally, I’m ambivalent. I’ve used it a lot in the past, but that’s before I found F5. I do have a lot of issues with NCH – the company that makes this software, but the software is pretty good.

Dragon Transcription Software

You’ll want to get the pro version. I’ve had numerous issues with the “free” version and vowed never to install it again! But the pro version doesn’t come with adware, supports most USB foot pedals, and plays videos and a lot of other formats. Though, the audio quality is not that great – especially if you slow it down.

The interface is a little complicated and you’ll have to take time to get used to this mac transcription software. For instance, here’s how you insert timestamps into your transcript. You’ll need to first create a system wide hotkey to copy the timecode to the mac clipboard. You can create a hotkey via Options > Hot Keys. Once you’ve created the hotkey, adding a timestamp to your transcript on Pages involves hitting the hotkey and then CMD + V to paste the timestamp.

Dictation Software Mac Free

Free Software For Mac

Very easy, but I wish it was more intuitive. So yes, there is a steep learning curve on how to use Express Scribe for transcription – well worth it, because this software has a lot of customizable features that are going to help you become a very efficient transcriber. Download from Mac App Store.

That’s it for this post on mac transcription software. I hope you’ve found it worthwhile and please feel free to use the comment section below to share tips, suggestion, frustrations, reviews etc on the transcription software of your choice. Happy transcribing!

There are a handful of capable, solid spreadsheet apps for Mac, but we've got our money on Excel thanks to its rich feature set, cross-platform (and web) compatibility, and data management tools.

Mac Transcribe Audio To Text

Microsoft Excel 2011

Platform: Mac OS X
Price: $120-200 (Part of Microsoft Office)
Download Page

Features

Create spreadsheets with integrated equations
Create attractive graphs from your data
Organize and filter your tables
Create thumbnail-sized 'sparkline' charts for viewing data at a glance
Visually enhance your data with boards, highlighting, and more
Automatically summarize your data with PivotTables
Use VisualBasic to create macros and add additional functionality to Excel
Use Excel's Automator actions to automate repetitive tasks
The Excel Web App will let you access your spreadsheets from anywhere
Comprehensive toolbar with the most commonly-used features
Easily filter data so you're not distracted by data you don't need to see

Where It Excels

Excel is an incredibly feature-rich application, to the point where it can even get a little overwhelming, while still offering simple spreadsheet functionality. If you know how to type data into boxes and perform calculations in any spreadsheet app you know how to do it in Excel. You don't have to dive into anything too deep to perform the most common tasks. Graph and chart creation is also very easy, as those buttons are readily available in your toolbar. While Apple touts the beauty of Numbers, its spreadsheet application (see the competition section below for more information), Excel is highly capable of creating attractive images as well. Overall, it gets the job done whether that job is simple, complex, or even requires a pleasant aesthetic.

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Where It Falls Short

Excel is really a spreadsheet app for power users, so it may be overwhelming for some. It's also been around for many years and it's hard to keep adding new, useful features to an app that already does its job well. As a result, Excel has become a little bloated. It can be very overwhelming to new users. Finding what you're looking for can be tough because there is so much there.

Excel Macro For Mac

Assuming you get past the learning curve, one of the more annoying issues with Excel for Mac is that it's different from Excel for Windows. While the applications are very similar, they're developed by different departments and often times the Windows version ends up with features and functionality that aren't present in the Mac version (and vice-versa). The most notable feature to have this problem is macro support. Macro support is finally back in Excel 2011 for Mac, but it's both been included and removed from versions in the past. Missing features can be a minor annoyance for some and a major one for others, so before you jump into Excel on the Mac you should make sure you're getting the features you expect.

The Competition

Numbers ($20) is Apple's entry into the spreadsheet software market and it's not bad. Number has always favored its stylish graphs over its feature set, but that doesn't make it useless. It's a very serviceable spreadsheet application for most people, and is a good option if you don't need something as intense as Excel.

Mesa ($34) and Tables (~$42) are both simple spreadsheet apps that, while very good, are hard to justify because of the cost. These two apps are very focused on offering a basic feature set and remaining focused, rather than becoming bloated software. The result is two very serviceable spreadsheet apps, but you have to wonder why you're paying so much for something that's not quite as capable as some cheaper apps.