The best bitrate for transcription 64 kbps mono, and rarely worth changing.
For transcription, 64 kbps mono MP3 is plenty for speech, and anything from 96 to 128 kbps stereo is too; higher rates add size, not words, while rates below about 32 kbps start to blur overlapping voices. To set it, run ffmpeg -i in.wav -ac 1 -b:a 64k out.mp3, or choose the bitrate in your editor's MP3 export dialog; at 64 kbps an hour is about 29 MB, so even 10 hours, the most one file can hold, is about 288 MB.
Bitrate, by the numbers
Megabytes an hour are the bitrate times 3,600, divided by 8,000.
The table to remember
32 kbps is about 14 MB an hour; 64 kbps about 29 MB; 96 kbps about 43 MB; 128 kbps about 58 MB; 192 kbps about 86 MB; 320 kbps about 144 MB. Even ten hours at 320 kbps is about 1.44 GB, under the 2 GB that uploads before a pack.
Where bitrate bites
The upload box on this page takes files up to 500 MB. At 64 kbps all 10 hours fit; at 128 kbps about 8.7 hours fit; at 320 kbps about 3.5 hours. A larger file continues on the main upload page, still up to 10 hours or 5 GB.
Leave a decent file alone
A phone memo, Zoom M4A or podcast MP3 is already at a sensible rate. Drop it on the upload page as it is. Re-encoding a 64 kbps file at 192 kbps triples the size and restores nothing the first encode threw away.
Codecs that do better
AAC and Opus keep speech clear at lower rates than MP3: a 48 kbps AAC or a 24 to 32 kbps Opus voice file usually sounds fine. If your recorder offers them, they are good choices for very long sessions; both upload as they are.
Where bitrate choices go wrong
Too low ruins a long recording once; too high only costs upload time.
✗ Chasing the wrong number
Most bitrate trouble is a voice-memo app set to its smallest size, or a needless re-encode.
- 16 kbps to fit a whole day on a card
- Re-encoding a small MP3 at 320 kbps
- Stereo 320 kbps for one voice
- Converting each part twice
- Splitting files to stay under a size cap
- Assuming a bigger file transcribes better
✓ Set it once, then forget it
Pick a speech rate on the recorder before the session, not after.
- 64 kbps mono for plain speech
- 96 to 128 kbps when people overlap
- AAC or Opus if the recorder offers it
- Upload the original, unconverted
- About 20 minutes for a 10-hour file
- $12 pack of 2,000 minutes for 33 hours 20 minutes
Sample
A day-long workshop recorded at 64 kbps mono, six hours in.
Illustrative only: these lines were written for this page and come from no real workshop. At 64 kbps the whole day is a file of under 200 MB.
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
- AI chat over the whole 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
- Summary, chapters and key quotes
- All export formats
- AI chat over the whole transcript
Bulk pack
$24/5,000 min
83 hours of audio — $0.29 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 5,000 minutes of audio
- Summary, chapters and key quotes
- API access for batch pipelines
- All export formats
FAQ
Bitrate, answered.
What is the lowest bitrate that still transcribes well?
For one clear voice, 32 kbps MP3 usually holds up. For several people, a noisy room or people talking over each other, stay at 64 kbps mono or above. Below that, consonants smear and similar words get harder to tell apart.
Does a higher bitrate make the transcript better?
Only up to the point where speech is clear, around 64 to 128 kbps. Above that the extra data describes sound the speech does not need. Converting a low-bitrate file upwards adds nothing at all.
What bitrate should I set on my recorder for a long session?
64 kbps mono MP3, or 96 to 128 kbps if the recorder only offers stereo. A 10-hour session at 128 kbps stereo is about 576 MB; at 64 kbps mono about 288 MB. Both upload in one piece.
Does bitrate change the price or the speed?
No. You pay for audio minutes and processing runs at about 2 minutes per audio hour whatever the bitrate. A 5-hour file is 300 minutes on the $6 pack of 500 minutes, back in about 10 minutes.
What about WAV and FLAC?
Uncompressed and lossless files are big but fine: a CD-quality stereo WAV is about 635 MB an hour, so a long one can pass 5 GB. Fold to mono or convert to a 64 kbps MP3 if that happens; the words do not change.
What do I get back?
A brief with thesis and takeaways, chapters with timestamps, the names, numbers and dates said, and a chat over the transcript, in 99 languages detected automatically. Exports are TXT, DOCX, SRT, VTT and JSON. Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and never used for training.
Related
Related pages
Upload it at the bitrate you have. 64 kbps or 320, the words are the same.
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