Transcribe podcast free, full episodes
Drop in a podcast episode and get a clean, accurate transcript back: perfect for show notes, blog posts, searchable archives and accessibility. Don't need the full transcript, just the highlights? Get a podcast episode summary instead, straight from the recording.
Related: Obsidian voice notes.
Last updated: September 2026
No account, no watermark, no per-minute fee.
No account. 10 recordings a day. Files up to 60 minutes here, and it resets at midnight.
Plain transcript and subtitles right here. Bleeping, translation and burned-in subtitles live in the full tool.
Why transcribe your podcast
A transcript turns a 60-minute episode into something Google can actually read and rank. It powers show notes, quote graphics, repurposed blog posts and a searchable back-catalogue, and it makes your show accessible to deaf and hard-of-hearing listeners. Publishing the transcript of podcast episodes on the same page as the audio player lets people read along, search, or skim before they decide to listen.
- Show notes and episode summaries in minutes
- Blog posts and newsletters from the same content
- Searchable archive of everything you've ever said
- Accurate quotes for clips and social posts
- Captions/subtitles for the video version
From recording to transcript
Upload the episode audio (MP3, WAV, M4A) or the video file if you record video. ScribeGrab transcribes the speech with our speech model and hands back the full text plus subtitle files. The transcript is plain podcast text, so it pastes cleanly into a CMS, a newsletter or a document. Episodes up to 60 minutes and 1.5 GB fit in a single upload.
- Export your episode as MP3 (or any common audio/video format).
- Open ScribeGrab and drop the file in.
- Wait a few minutes while it transcribes on our GPU.
- Download the transcript as TXT, and SRT/VTT if you want captions.
Interviews: turning a conversation into quotable text
An interview is just multi-speaker audio: questions and answers, one person then another. Record it however you like (a handheld recorder, your phone's voice memo app, or a call you saved), then upload the audio file here. What comes back is the whole conversation as text you can pull quotes from, drop into an article, or turn into pull-quote graphics for social.
Clean, turn-taking Q&A transcribes really well. Where it gets harder is heavy crosstalk, two people talking over each other, so if your interview has a lot of that, read the transcript through before you quote from it. ScribeGrab automatically splits the transcript into speaker turns when it hears more than one voice, so a busy multi-person recording still comes back with who-said-what marked.
Meetings: from a Zoom or Teams recording to notes
One thing to be clear about up front: ScribeGrab can't sit in on a live call or connect to your Zoom, Teams or Meet account. What it does is transcribe the recording after the meeting. Every major platform lets you save one, Record in Zoom, Teams and Google Meet produces an MP4 or M4A file once the call ends. Download that file, upload it here, and you get the full meeting as text.
From there the transcript becomes searchable minutes: scan it for decisions and action items, see who committed to what, and keep an archive you can search months later instead of scrubbing through an hour of video. Because meetings are the messiest kind of audio, several speakers, people cutting in, variable mic quality, treat the transcript as a strong first draft and proofread the structured notes you build from it.
Lectures and study recordings
Students and self-learners use the same flow to turn an hour of lecture into notes you can actually skim. Record the class (or use the recording your school provides), upload the file, and get the full text back. From there you can highlight the parts that matter, search for a term the lecturer mentioned once, or paste sections into your own notes. A single clear speaker at a lectern is close to the best case for accuracy; a noisy hall or a distant mic is where you'll want to proofread.
Not just podcasts: voice memos, any audio file, and video too
The same tool works for more than a finished episode. Transcribe a voice recording from your phone, a lecture you captured on a handheld recorder, or a call you saved as audio: anything you can upload, ScribeGrab will transcribe from audio to text in the same few minutes, whether it runs twenty seconds or an hour. If you need to transcribe audio recording after audio recording, there is no separate mode to pick. The same box takes any recording you can export as audio or video, from a single voice memo to a panel discussion.
Podcast AI tools often charge per minute; here the transcription is audio to text free of any per-minute fee. Short clips work too, and faster: a one-minute clip comes back in seconds. Episodes you saved from Apple Podcasts, the BBC or anywhere else work once you have the audio file. Want podcast clips for social media as well? Cut one with captions on the podcast clip page.
Video works too. Recorded the episode on camera instead of just audio? Upload the MP4 directly and ScribeGrab will transcribe MP4 files by pulling the audio track out first, so you don't need to extract it yourself. The same goes if you need to transcribe audio from video shot on a phone or webcam, or a screen recording saved to MP4: MP4 transcribe jobs go through the same box.
How to transcribe a recording for free
Export or save the audio, then drop the file into the box above: that's the whole process, whether it's a podcast episode, an interview or a meeting. There's no length trick or hidden tier. You transcribe audio for free up to 60 minutes per file, 10 files a day, and to transcribe audio file free of charge you need no software, no sign-up and no card. If you need to transcribe files from a whole season, spread them over a few days, because the free count is 10 a day. If you want to transcribe for free without a trial clock ticking, that's the whole deal. Here is how to get a transcript of a podcast you downloaded: upload the audio file and save the TXT. The limits on free podcast transcription here are 10 recordings a day and 60 minutes per file.
Prefer plain text over juggling a video file? This is how you transcribe podcast to text free: transcribe MP3 files straight from your recorder, or export the episode first. How to transcribe audio here: upload, wait a few minutes, download. Transcribing podcasts this way is free whether it's a one-off episode or something you come back to weekly, with no per-episode charge, and Spotify podcast transcription works too once you've exported the audio.
What transcribes well, what doesn't
Clear studio audio transcribes very accurately. Two guests talking over each other or heavy background music are harder for any tool, so give those episodes a quick proofread. If the episode itself has hum, hiss or fan noise sitting behind the voices, cleaning it up before you upload tends to help both the listener and the transcript; see CleanGrab's podcast audio cleaner. Curious how close it gets? Read our take on how accurate AI transcription really is, and see audio to text for the general workflow across every format.
Combined several episodes' notes into one PDF and want to drop a blank or duplicate cover page? ScanReviver's delete pages removes just that page and keeps the rest in order.
Invoicing a sponsor for this episode's ad read? ScanReviver's invoice generator turns the rate and details into a proper PDF invoice in a couple of minutes.
By Sam Ridder, I build and run ScribeGrab on my own hardware, on my own. Who I am.
Before you pick a tool for a whole podcast back catalogue, it helps to compare the free limits of the best free transcription tools.
Sources
- Transcripts | Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) | W3C: Transcripts serve Deaf and hard of hearing people
Frequently asked
Is it really free for full episodes?
Yes. 10 recordings a day, no per-minute charge, up to 60 minutes and 1.5 GB per file. Ads keep the GPU running. That makes this a free podcast transcript generator with a daily limit rather than a monthly one: you can transcribe audio free every day, and the count resets at midnight. The podcast transcript generator free tier includes speaker labels too.
How to transcribe a podcast episode, step by step?
Export the episode as MP3, WAV or M4A (or use the video file), drop it on the box above, and download the transcript as TXT, SRT or VTT a few minutes later. That is also how to transcribe an audio file of any other kind: no software to install, no account.
Can I get show-note-ready text?
You get the full transcript as TXT, one line per sentence, plus SRT/VTT subtitles. Paste the transcript text into your notes or CMS and trim as needed. If you only want the highlights, the podcast episode summary page writes a short version instead.
Does it label who said what?
Yes. When it hears two to eight voices it adds speaker labels automatically, with nothing to switch on, and so two hosts and a guest come back as separate turns. Labels are estimated from the voices, so check them where people talk over each other.
What about two hosts talking at once?
It handles clean speech very well; heavy crosstalk is harder for any transcriber, so proofread those parts.
Can I transcribe Spotify podcast episodes straight from a link?
No. Spotify and Apple Podcasts stream the episode rather than handing out a file, so a link to text isn't possible here, and a podcast transcript generator from link won't work on those URLs either. Download or export the episode's audio first (many shows also publish an MP3 feed outside Spotify), then upload that file to get the text from it. No Spotify or Apple account is needed on this page.
Can the podcast transcript generator handle a two-hour episode?
Not in one free upload: a single file is capped at 60 minutes, so split a two-hour interview into two uploads, or use the €5 pass, which takes files up to 4 hours.
How long does podcast to transcript take?
A few minutes for a full episode, and a 10-minute episode is back in well under a minute. Nothing is transcribed by hand: the speech model does it. A two-host conversation isn't slower than a solo one; splitting it into speaker turns happens automatically at the end.
Can I transcribe podcasts in bulk?
One at a time through the browser, up to 10 episodes a day. For a back-catalogue, work through it a batch of ten a day.
What podcast transcript format works best for finding a specific quote?
The SRT. It carries a timestamp next to every line, so the podcast and transcript stay linked and you can jump to the second a line was said. The TXT is the one for reading and searching.
Does background music under the voices hurt the transcript?
It can: transcript AI accuracy dips where music plays under speech. The text still comes back, but proofread those parts.
Can I get podcast transcripts for episodes in another language?
Yes, in about 100 languages, detected automatically. No language picker needed.
Can it join or record my Zoom/Teams call?
No. ScribeGrab doesn't connect to your meeting account or capture a live call. Use your platform's Record button, download the resulting MP4/M4A after the call, then upload that file here to transcribe it.
How does this compare to Otter, Adobe Podcast or Restream?
Otter needs an account and meters minutes. Adobe Podcast bundles transcription with its podcast recording tool and needs an Adobe account. Restream is built for livestreams and needs a Restream account. Google transcribe options usually need a live microphone or a Google account, and chat assistants such as ChatGPT or Gemini aren't built for long episode files. This transcription tool works from any saved recording with no account, and podcast transcription free of charge has no minute meter.
Can this plug into NotebookLM or n8n?
No, there is no direct plug-in for either. This page is a plain upload box: export the audio from whatever tool made it, then upload the file.
Can I transcribe a podcast recorded on a plain voice recorder or as a video call?
Yes. A handheld voice recorder, a phone or a computer: the file uploads the same way. A video call recording works too, because the audio track is pulled out first.
Do you keep my audio?
No. Your file is deleted right after processing and results are wiped within 45 minutes (24 hours with any pass, free or paid). See privacy.
Do I need a special tool to transcribe audio from a podcast?
No. Export the episode as MP3, WAV or M4A, drop it in the upload box on this page and download the text a few minutes later. There is nothing to install and no account to make.
Is there a podcast transcript AI that does not need an account?
Yes, this page works without one. Upload the episode, wait a few minutes while the speech model runs on our GPU, then download the transcript. Check names and technical terms afterwards, because every automatic transcript gets some of those wrong.
Can I transcribe my audio from a phone voice memo?
Yes. Voice memos are normal audio files, so send the memo to your computer or pick it from your phone's files and upload it the same way as an episode.
How can I transcribe an audio file for free?
Drop it in the box above. You get 10 recordings a day, up to 60 minutes each, with no account, no watermark and no card. Longer files need to be split, or you can use the pass that takes up to 4 hours.
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