If you’re a professional transcriptionist looking for work, check out my other blog posts for tons of work-from-home resources, or browse online jobs on FlexJobs here (note: you can currently get 30% off by using promo code Save30 at checkout).
If you’d rather just skip to the end for my recommendation for the best free transcription software (and get a discount on pro software), click here.
This is a pretty long post, with detailed info on the features of each program. (In many cases, it’s actually faster to transcribe from scratch than to edit an error-laden rendering from an auto-transcription tool.) This also isn’t a post about tools that auto-magically do the typing for you – as in, you upload a dictation and out pops a transcript. This isn’t a post about speech recognition or dictation software like Dragon NaturallySpeaking, although you can use these tools with the software I recommend here if you choose to. Professionals in many industries can benefit from this type of software, including audio transcriptionists, journalists, researchers, and filmmakers. Note that this post is about transcription software that’s designed to help you transcribe audio recordings manually. The software runs in the background, so you don’t have to keep switching between the audio player and your word processing software. Using hotkeys or a foot pedal, you can quickly and easily navigate the audio and re-listen to hard-to-hear phrases. Transcription software speeds up the process of converting audio files to text. Whether you’re transcribing medical, legal, academic (qualitative research), post-production, or other content, you’ll find something here that fits the bill. In today’s post, I’ll be sharing my recommendations for the best free transcription software based on my experience as a professional audio transcriptionist.
PDF output can be optimized for web, print, and on-screen viewing, with the program actively working to reduce PDF file sizes.The Best Free Transcription Software for Mac and PC For example, you can split Word documents into single page PDFs automatically, complete with variable file names based on page number, user name, current date, and other factors. There's a whole lot of flexibility to be found in BatchOutput DOC, too. With BatchOutput DOC, all you need to do is select files and adjust your output settings, then sit back and let the program do all of the heavy lifting! Skeptical? You can process hundreds of Word files in an overnight batch, coming in to pick up your newly produced PDF files with your morning coffee in hand! Your coworkers will think you slept in the office to accomplish such a feat, because they won't know that you had BatchOutput DOC in your arsenal of tricks! But now, you can do this barely lifting a finger, thanks to today's discount software promotion, BatchOutput DOC!!īatchOutput DOC lets you automate printing and PDF production from Microsoft Word. However, if you need to output dozens - or hundreds - of Word documents you're in for long hours of tedious and unproductive work. Microsoft Office users know that Word provides easy facilities for basic printing and PDF export.