Microsoft is adding automated transcription to Word on the web, giving Microsoft 365 subscribers unlimited transcriptions of recordings made through the program…
Microsoft is adding automated transcription to Word on the web, giving Microsoft 365 subscribers unlimited transcriptions of recordings made through the program at no extra cost, and up to five hours of free transcription per month for audio recorded and uploaded separately. The new feature, announced this morning, will compete with free and paid automatic transcription services and programs such as Otter.ai, Temi, Google Live Transcribe, Nuance’s Dragon software, and others. There are hundreds of millions of Microsoft 365 subscribers who have access to Word and other Office programs, increasing the potential impact of Microsoft’s move. Advances in artificial intelligence and speech recognition have made automatic transcription a viable, if not yet fully accurate, alternative to human transcription in many scenarios. The shift to virtual meetings has also fueled the demand for automatic transcription, as users take advantage of built-in recording features in video conferencing services. In another high-profile example, Zoom and Otter.ai rolled out a transcription feature as part of paid subscription plans earlier this year.
