How big is an 8-hour MP3? About 461 MB at 128 kbps.
An 8-hour MP3 is about 461 MB at 128 kbps, about 230 MB at 64 kbps and about 1.15 GB at 320 kbps, because an MP3's size is simply its bitrate multiplied by its length. At any of those bitrates the file uploads whole (it stays under the 2 GB first-upload line and the 10-hour or 5 GB file limit), is transcribed in about 16 minutes, and its 480 minutes fit inside the $6 pack of 500 minutes, on top of the first 20 minutes free.
Eight hours, measured
An MP3 the length of a working day.
Bitrate times seconds
Eight hours is 28,800 seconds. At 128,000 bits a second that is 3,686,400,000 bits, or about 461 MB once divided by eight. Sample rate and stereo or mono only matter through the bitrate the encoder chose.
The range you will see
32 kbps mono, common for dictation: about 115 MB. 64 kbps: about 230 MB. 96 kbps: about 346 MB. 192 kbps: about 691 MB. 320 kbps: about 1.15 GB. Variable-bitrate files fall between the ends of their range.
Where eight-hour MP3s come from
Overnight sleep or room recordings, a full conference day off a mixing desk, dictation recorders left running, an audiobook joined into one file, or a long podcast archive episode. All of them go in from this page or the upload page.
Sixteen minutes, then chapters
At roughly 2 minutes of processing per audio hour, eight hours takes about 16. A day that long is hard to skim, so the chapters with timestamps and the brief matter most: they show where each session, topic or silence starts.
The eight-hour problem
Why a full-day MP3 is hard to transcribe elsewhere.
✗ Short limits, long files
Most tools were sized for a meeting or a voice note, so eight hours means cutting the day into pieces first.
- Length caps of one or two hours
- Upload boxes in the tens of megabytes
- Eight separate transcripts to merge
- Timestamps restarting in every piece
- A day of audio nobody re-listens to
- No outline of what happened when
✓ One file, one clock
The full day uploads as recorded and comes back as one searchable transcript.
- 461 MB uploads without a pack
- About 16 minutes to text
- One timestamp clock for all eight hours
- Each session of the day as a chapter
- Names, figures and dates listed
- 480 of the $6 pack's 500 minutes
Sample output
Across an eight-hour conference day.
Illustrative lines only, not drawn from a real event. Note how the clock keeps running through the breaks.
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
Eight-hour MP3s, answered.
How long does an 8-hour MP3 take to transcribe?
About 16 minutes after it has uploaded. On the public proof page, a 9.31-hour recording finished in 1,033 seconds, a little over 17 minutes.
What does an 8-hour MP3 cost?
Eight hours is 480 minutes, which fits the $6 pack (500 minutes). On a first visit the first 20 minutes are free as well, so the pack has a little more left over afterwards. Credits never expire.
Is an 8-hour MP3 too big to upload before I buy anything?
No. Even at 320 kbps it is about 1.15 GB, under the 2 GB line for uploads before a first pack. At 128 kbps it is under 500 MB.
Should I split the day into shorter files?
There is no need under 10 hours. One file keeps a single clock, so a quote at 06:12:00 matches the recording directly. Split only if the recording runs past 10 hours.
What about the silent stretches in an overnight recording?
Silence produces no text and the transcript simply jumps ahead in time. Music, sound effects and crowd noise are not transcribed either; the speech is. The minutes used follow the full length of the file.
Which exports and languages are available?
TXT, DOCX, SRT, VTT and JSON, with 99 languages detected automatically. Your MP3s are transcribed on our own servers and are never used for training.
Related
Related questions about long MP3s.
Eight hours of MP3. About sixteen minutes to text.
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