Happy Scribe's AI plans cost $17, $29 or $89 a month billed monthly ($8.50, $19 or $59 billed yearly), unused plan minutes reset every billing cycle, and extra minutes are $0.20 each, which is $12 an hour. WhipScribe sells packs instead, from $4 for 500 minutes ($0.29 to $0.48 an hour) that never expire, and returns an hour of audio in about 2 minutes.
Their price page, line by line
Every figure below was read on happyscribe.com/pricing on 4 October 2026. Prices change; their page is the authority for what you would pay today.
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed yearly | AI minutes included | Per recording |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | 10-minute free trial | 45 minutes |
| Basic | $17 / month | $8.50 / month | 120 a month, or 1,440 a year | 90 minutes |
| Pro | $29 / month | $19 / month | 600 a month, or 7,200 a year | Unlimited |
| Business | $89 / month | $59 / month | 6,000 a month, or 72,000 a year | Unlimited |
| Top-up credits | $0.20 a minute ($12 an hour), on Basic, Pro and Business | As many as you buy | Plan limit applies | |
Human proofreading is a separate service, listed from $2.00 a minute. Everything on this page is about AI transcription.
Is Happy Scribe free?
Happy Scribe's Free plan is a 10-minute free trial of AI transcription, subtitling and translation, with a limit of 45 minutes per recording (happyscribe.com/pricing, 4 October 2026). That is enough to judge the output on one short clip. To transcribe more you choose Basic, Pro or Business.
WhipScribe works differently. Every recording you send gets a free preview, and the summary of any recording is free to read, at any length, before you pay anything. The full transcript and exports open with a pack, and the smallest pack is $4 for 500 minutes, a little over 8 hours of audio. There is no monthly fee and no seat fee, and the minutes you do not use stay in your balance.
What a real month costs
Happy Scribe's cheapest option for each month, billed monthly, against WhipScribe packs or Workspace. The arithmetic is shown so you can check it.
| Your month | Happy Scribe, cheapest option | WhipScribe |
|---|---|---|
| A quiet month, nothing to transcribe | $17 on Basic (the plan bills either way) | $0; your balance waits |
| 2 hours | $17 on Basic (120 minutes, exactly used) | $4 pack, with 380 minutes left over |
| One 3-hour recording | $29 on Pro (Basic allows 90 minutes a file) | $4 pack, 180 of 500 minutes |
| 10 hours | $29 on Pro (600 minutes) | $8 pack (1,000 minutes, about 16.7 hours) |
| 30 hours | $89 on Business (Pro plus 1,200 top-up minutes would be $269) | $12 pack (2,000 minutes, about 33 hours) |
| 100 hours | $89 on Business (6,000 minutes) | $19 Workspace, or $32 in packs ($24 + $8) |
Billed yearly, Happy Scribe Pro is $19 a month for 7,200 minutes a year: $228 for 120 hours, about $1.90 an hour, paid up front. The same 120 hours on WhipScribe is $40 in packs ($24 + $12 + $4, 7,500 minutes) bought whenever you need them. For 14 services side by side, see the price-per-hour proof.
Happy Scribe vs the others people compare it with
Each figure was read on that company's own website on 4 October 2026. The last column prices 10 hours of AI transcription in one month on the cheapest option listed.
| Service | How it charges | Entry paid option | 10 hours in a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| WhipScribe | Packs, never expire | $4 for 500 minutes | $8 |
| Happy Scribe | Monthly plans, minutes reset | Basic $17 a month, 120 minutes | $29 (Pro) |
| Speechnotes | Pay per minute, no subscription | $0.10 a minute | $60 |
| Noota | Monthly plans, per user | Pro $29 a month per user, 1,000 minutes ($19 billed yearly) | $29 (Pro) |
| Notta | Monthly plans, no carryover | Pro $13.49 a month, 1,800 minutes, up to 5 hours a recording | $13.49 (Pro) |
| Checksub | Monthly plans with hour credits | Junior $18 a month, 2 hours | Above Starter's 5 hours ($59 a month) |
| Verbit | Custom quotes | No public prices; book a demo | Quote only |
Where the others win. Notta's Pro includes 30 hours a month for $13.49, so if you steadily transcribe 20 to 30 hours every month, it costs about what our $12 pack does, as long as no recording runs past 5 hours. Noota and Checksub bundle meeting recording, dubbing and subtitle tools that some teams want more than the transcript. Verbit sells to courts, campuses and enterprises with captioning contracts. Happy Scribe itself has human proofreading and a subtitle editor. If those are what you are buying, the per-hour price matters less.
Where packs win. Uneven months, long files and small budgets. Nothing renews, nothing resets, and one file can run up to 10 hours. If you want a transcript of a podcast, a lecture or a long interview without another subscription, that is the case packs were built for.
Our side of the comparison
| Option | Price | Minutes | Per hour |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pack | $4 | 500 | $0.48 |
| Pack | $8 | 1,000 | $0.48 |
| Pack | $12 | 2,000 | $0.36 |
| Pack | $24 | 5,000 | $0.29 |
| Workspace | $19 / month | Fair use of 700 hours | $0.19 at 100 hours |
Pack credits never expire and there is no seat fee. Workspace suits people who record every day and want every recording kept in one searchable library. Current prices are always on the pricing page.
Check it on your own file
What the price buys
Every line timestamped to the original recording, searchable, and exported as TXT, DOCX, SRT, VTT or JSON on every pack. No higher tier is needed for a format.
A brief with the thesis and takeaways, chapters with timestamps, the names, numbers and dates that were said, and a chat over the transcript. Speakers are identified and named in the summary, key quotes and chapters.
Up to 10 hours or 5 GB a file, 99+ languages, and any audio or video format. Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and are never used for training.
Questions
Billed monthly, Basic is $17 a month for 120 minutes, Pro is $29 for 600 minutes and Business is $89 for 6,000 minutes. Billed yearly they are $8.50, $19 and $59 a month. Extra minutes on a paid plan are $0.20 each. Figures read on happyscribe.com/pricing on 4 October 2026.
Its Free plan is a 10-minute free trial of AI transcription, subtitling and translation, with a limit of 45 minutes per recording, per happyscribe.com/pricing on 4 October 2026. After that you need a paid plan. On WhipScribe every recording gets a free preview and the summary is free to read; the full transcript opens with a pack from $4.
Plan minutes do not. Happy Scribe's page says unused plan credits are reset at the end of each billing cycle, while topped-up credits stay until used (checked 4 October 2026). WhipScribe pack minutes never expire, so a quiet month costs nothing.
On Happy Scribe the cheapest option is Pro billed monthly at $29, since 600 minutes is exactly 10 hours. On WhipScribe it is one $8 pack of 1,000 minutes, which covers about 16.7 hours, and the minutes left over stay in your balance.
Happy Scribe's Basic plan allows 90 minutes per recording, so a longer file needs Pro or Business (checked 4 October 2026). WhipScribe takes one file up to 10 hours or 5 GB on any pack, so a 3-hour interview uses 180 of the 500 minutes in a $4 pack.
Read on each company's own page on 4 October 2026: Speechnotes charges $0.10 a minute with no subscription, Noota Pro is $29 a month per user for 1,000 minutes, Notta Pro is $13.49 a month for 1,800 minutes, Checksub Junior is $18 a month for 2 hours, and Verbit publishes no prices and quotes on request. For 10 hours in a month that is $60 on Speechnotes, $29 on Noota, $13.49 on Notta, $29 on Happy Scribe and $8 on WhipScribe.
When you need human proofreading (listed from $2.00 a minute) or Happy Scribe's subtitling and translation tools, or when your team already works inside it. If you mostly need AI transcripts of recorded files at an uneven pace, packs that never expire usually cost less.
Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and are never used for training. You can delete a recording and its transcript at any time.
Related
Free preview on every file. Packs from $4 for 500 minutes, and the minutes never expire.
Beyond this one product: see an honest roundup of the best transcription services and the cheapest way to transcribe an hour of audio.