Use This App on Mac, IPhone and IPad for Free AI Transcription
Transcription is no fun. The good thing is that the AI is really good at this. Aiko is an app for Mac, iPad, and iPhone that uses Whisper , an open-source technology created by OpenAI, to transcribe audio files. Aiko does not upload the file to the cloud for transcription; everything happens on your device. And it works pretty quickly: I was able to transcribe a half-hour radio show in just a few minutes.
The app works best on devices with Apple Silicon processors (Intel Mac is technically supported, but is very slow to decrypt); my 2022 iPhone SE was significantly faster than my 2018 Intel MacBook Pro, which took about three minutes to transcribe 10 seconds of conversation. However, if you have the right hardware, this application is almost perfect.
To get started, you either need to tell the app a file or start recording what you want to transcribe. You can add any audio or video file to the app, which will immediately begin creating a transcription for you. The recording feature is mainly for quick notes – the software advises you to write something down using another app first if at all possible. The mobile version can capture audio from the Voice Memos app, which is a nice touch.
The app will show you the text as it is transcribed, meaning you can start reading before the full transcription is complete. The application automatically detects the language spoken, although you can set a different language in the settings if you wish. If you want, you can even set the app to automatically translate a conversation from a non-English language to English.
It’s not a perfect app—it’s impossible to tell who’s speaking in a text, for example. However, it’s fast and completely free, so it’s hard to complain about it too much. From now on, this will be an indispensable tool for me.