Audio file too large to transcribe? Try a bigger door.
Your recording was refused somewhere for being too large. Here one file can be up to 5 GB and 10 hours, so most refused files go up unchanged, and a pasted link skips the upload. Files up to 2 GB start with the first 20 minutes free.
Why it was refused
Most size errors come from limits set for short clips.
Why tools refuse big files
Many transcription services set their upload cap for short clips, often tens or a few hundred megabytes, because their pipeline sends the whole file to a model at once. A long WAV, an hour of video or an all-day recorder file is over that cap before anything is wrong with it.
What works here
One file up to 5 GB and 10 hours goes up as it is. The box on this page takes up to 500 MB; bigger files go from the upload page. An upload above 2 GB begins once a pack sits on the account.
When a link is easier
If the recording is on YouTube, a podcast feed, Google Drive, Vimeo, Twitch or Kick, paste the link. The file is fetched directly, which is faster than downloading it and uploading it again.
If it is over 5 GB here too
Export the audio only: a video's soundtrack is a small fraction of its size, often less than a tenth. A WAV saved as MP3 shrinks by about ten times with no loss that matters for speech. As a last step, cut it into two files.
Fixing a refused file
The workarounds usually cost more time than the transcript.
✗ Making the file smaller
Every common fix for a size error trades away either your time, your audio quality or your timeline.
- Converting to a lower bitrate
- Trimming silence and losing context
- Cutting into parts for a per-file cap
- Downloading a cloud file to re-upload it
- Re-encoding that changes the length slightly
- Trial and error with each new tool
✓ A ceiling high enough to skip it
With 5 GB and 10 hours per file, the original recording almost always fits, so the workaround step disappears.
- Original quality kept
- Every second of audio kept
- One file, one transcript
- Links fetched straight from the source
- Timestamps that match the original
- The first 20 minutes free up to 2 GB
Sample output
A three-hour board meeting, refused elsewhere.
An illustrative excerpt, not a real meeting. A 2 GB WAV of a long board meeting comes back as one transcript, with the numbers that were said pulled into the brief.
Export
One transcript. Five clean formats.
Every pack exports all five — no format is held back for a higher tier.
Plain text
De-ummed paragraphs. Ready to paste.
SRT captions
Timed to the speech. Every video editor reads this.
WebVTT
HTML5 player + YouTube uploads.
Show notes
Formatted with chapters and pull-quotes.
Machine-readable
Timestamped text for your own tools.
Pricing
Honest pricing, no surprises.
A pack from $6 (500 minutes) opens the full transcript. After that, no subscription and no auto-renew — every tier is a one-time minute pack, and credits never expire. Buy once, use the minutes whenever you need them.
Casual pack
$6/500 min
8 hours of audio — $0.72 an hour. One-time — credits never expire.
- 500 minutes of audio
- All export formats
- Unlimited AI chat per transcript
- Executive summary & key quote
Best value
$12/2,000 min
33 hours of audio — $0.36 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 2,000 minutes of audio
- Priority queue
- All export formats
- Unlimited AI chat per transcript
Bulk pack
$24/5,000 min
83 hours of audio — $0.29 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 5,000 minutes of audio
- Priority queue
- API access for batch pipelines
- All export formats
FAQ
Too-large files, answered.
Why did another tool say my audio file is too large?
Its upload cap was most likely set for short clips. A recording of a few hours easily passes tens or hundreds of megabytes, especially as WAV or video. Phone recorders set to high quality and conference room systems that save uncompressed audio are the usual sources of a file that feels too large.
What is the largest file I can upload here?
5 GB, and up to 10 hours long. Files over 2 GB start once a pack is on the account; smaller ones start with the first 20 minutes free.
How much will a large file cost?
Price follows the length of the audio. A three-hour board meeting is 180 minutes, which the $6 pack of 500 minutes covers with 320 to spare. The file being large does not raise the price at all; a 2 GB WAV and a 100 MB MP3 of that meeting cost exactly the same.
How long will it take once it is uploaded?
About 2 minutes per hour of audio, so three hours is usually ready in about six minutes. You can close the tab while it runs; the finished transcript waits in your Library.
Should I compress the file before trying again?
Only if it is over 5 GB. Under that, send the original. If you do convert, a 128 kbps MP3 is about 58 MB an hour and is plenty for speech. For a single microphone, mono at 64 kbps is fine too and half that size again.
Which languages and formats come back, and is my audio private?
Speech in any of 99 languages is detected without a setting, and you can export TXT, DOCX, SRT, VTT or JSON. Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and are never used for training.
Related
More on size.
Too large elsewhere? Most files fit here as they are.
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