Transcribe a long ACT recorder file the lecture your pocket recorder kept.
A three-hour ACT recording is 180 minutes of audio: it transcribes in about 6 minutes and fits the $4 pack (300 minutes), and the opening minutes are a free preview. ACT files from budget voice recorders are tiny, often 3 to 4 MB an hour, but some tools do not read them, so if the upload refuses one, convert it to MP3 first.
The ACT format
Cheap recorders squeeze hours of voice into almost nothing. The file is small; the work is in the format.
What makes ACT files
ACT is a voice format written by many low-cost digital voice recorders and some older MP3 players built on the same chips. Students leave one running on the desk for a whole lecture block, and journalists and researchers use them because the battery and memory last for days.
How small an hour is
The common ACT mode stores speech at around 8 kbps, which works out near 3.6 MB an hour, so a ten-hour file is often under 40 MB. Some recorders have higher-quality modes that make larger files, and those still stay far below the 500 MB the box on this page accepts.
Converting when you need to
Many builds of ffmpeg read ACT directly: ffmpeg -i lecture.act lecture.mp3 is usually all it takes, and VLC can play many of them too. Some recorders ship a small converter on the device or offer a WAV or MP3 recording mode, which skips the step next time. Then upload from the upload page.
Lecture notes from a recording
A long lecture returns a brief with the thesis and takeaways, chapters with timestamps, the names, numbers and dates the lecturer said, the questions the lecture answers, and a chat over the transcript to ask what was meant by a point.
Recorder files, the usual way
A recorder in the bag holds a term of lectures. Getting them out is where most people stop.
✗ Files that stay on the device
An unfamiliar extension, then a hunt for a player, then nothing gets typed.
- An extension the laptop does not know
- Players that refuse to open it
- Converters full of ads
- Lectures cut into short pieces
- Notes written from memory the night before
- Hours of audio nobody plays back
✓ Convert once, read the lecture
One MP3 per lecture, uploaded whole, read in minutes.
- A 3-hour lecture in about 6 minutes
- Chapters that follow the slides
- Terms and dates listed
- A chat that explains a point again
- Captions for review sessions
- Credits that last all term
Illustrative transcript
Two hours into a long seminar recorded on a pocket recorder.
Invented for this page; no real lecture or lecturer. The times follow the length of the recording.
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 $4 (300 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
$4/300 min
5 hours of audio — $0.80 an hour. One-time — credits never expire.
- 300 minutes of audio
- All export formats
- AI chat over the whole transcript
- Executive summary & key quote
Best value
$18/3,000 min
50 hours of audio — $0.36 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 3,000 minutes of audio
- Summary, chapters and key quotes
- All export formats
- AI chat over the whole transcript
Bulk pack
$32/6,000 min
100 hours of audio — $0.32 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 6,000 minutes of audio
- Summary, chapters and key quotes
- API access for batch pipelines
- All export formats
FAQ
Long ACT files: common questions
Does the upload take ACT files?
It may not recognise them. If the upload refuses the file, convert it to MP3 or MP4 with ffmpeg or VLC; for most ACT files that is one short command, and the transcript is the same either way.
How long does a three-hour ACT recording take?
About 6 minutes after the upload, at roughly 2 minutes per audio hour. A full ten-hour file takes about 20 minutes, and the proof page shows 9.31 hours done in 1,033 seconds.
What does a term of lectures cost?
Packs start at $4 for 300 minutes, and credits never expire. A single week of seminars adding up to 10 hours is 600 minutes, on the $18 pack (3,000 minutes).
The audio is noisy. Will it still work?
Speech comes through; the scrape of chairs and room noise are not transcribed. Put the recorder near the speaker when you can, because distance hurts more than the compression does.
My recorder made one file longer than 10 hours.
Split it into two at a pause with ffmpeg and upload both. Each part gets its own transcript with its clock starting at zero.
What languages, which exports, and is it private?
99 languages detected automatically, with English terms inside other languages handled. Exports are TXT, DOCX, SRT, VTT and JSON. Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and are never used for training.
Related
Related long recordings
A term of lectures on a recorder. Text in minutes per lecture.
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