Free tool
Podcast transcript
Drop an episode here to get its podcast transcript: every paragraph comes with the time it starts, ready to become show notes, chapter markers, quotes for social posts or subtitles for the video version.
- Free
- Times for chapters
- Nothing is stored
Drop your podcast episode here, or Choose your podcast episode
MP3, M4A, WAV, AAC, FLAC, OGG or WebM. Up to 30 minutes of each file, 3 free files a day. The language is detected automatically.
Publishing every week? NoteOwl transcribes whole episodes on your Mac with unlimited transcription, labels the host and each guest, and drafts the show notes.
How it works
How do you transcribe a podcast?
Export the episode, or download it from your host, and drop the file here. The converter splits the audio at natural pauses, turns each part into text and lays the result out in timed paragraphs. Copy it, or save subtitles and a Word file.
- 1
Get the episode file
The finished MP3 from your hosting dashboard or editing software. A video podcast’s MP4 works too: only its sound is used.
- 2
Watch the text arrive
Paragraphs appear in order, each stamped with its start time. Up to 30 minutes of every episode are transcribed.
- 3
Take what you need
Paste the text into your episode page, or download SRT, VTT or Word.
Should you transcribe the final mix or the raw voice tracks?
The final mix, when the times matter: they’ll match the episode people hear. For the cleanest words, export that same edit a second time with the music muted. The timeline doesn’t move, so every time still lines up.
Raw recordings from before the edit transcribe cleanly as well, but each cut you made afterwards shifts the clock, so their times drift away from the published episode.
What happens to intro music and sound effects?
Silence and steady hum are left out, but music is sent like speech. A music bed can leave a stray line in the transcript, and a song with lyrics can come back as its words. Read the first and last paragraphs and delete anything nobody said.
Music playing under someone talking costs more: it competes with the voice for the whole segment. That’s where the muted-music export pays off.
How do you turn a podcast transcript into show notes and chapters?
Skim the timed paragraphs for the moments the conversation changes subject. Each one becomes a chapter with its start time. The strongest lines become pull quotes, and the books, people and sites mentioned on air become the resource list.
The podcast show notes template puts these parts in order for you.
- Summary
- Where to find it in the transcriptThe host’s introduction in the first minute or two
- Chapters
- Where to find it in the transcriptThe paragraph times where the topic changes
- Pull quotes
- Where to find it in the transcriptA guest’s most quotable sentences, copied word for word
- Resources
- Where to find it in the transcriptEvery book, product, person or website named on air
- Full text
- Where to find it in the transcriptThe whole episode, for listeners who’d rather read and for search engines
| Part of the episode page | Where to find it in the transcript |
|---|---|
| Summary | The host’s introduction in the first minute or two |
| Chapters | The paragraph times where the topic changes |
| Pull quotes | A guest’s most quotable sentences, copied word for word |
| Resources | Every book, product, person or website named on air |
| Full text | The whole episode, for listeners who’d rather read and for search engines |
Can you add your own transcript to Apple Podcasts or YouTube?
Yes. YouTube takes SRT and VTT caption files, so either download works for the video version. Apple Podcasts writes its own transcripts, but you can switch your show to yours in Apple Podcasts Connect and link the file in your RSS feed, if your host supports transcripts.
Apple accepts these files in English, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish and Swedish, and a VTT file can name the speaker of each line. The VTT you download here has no names, so add them before uploading it.
Want the host and every guest labelled in each episode?
NoteOwl transcribes episodes of any length on your Mac with unlimited transcription and labels each speaker, so the host and every guest get their own lines. It drafts show notes from the transcript and saves subtitles too. See how podcasters use it.
FAQ
Questions about podcast transcripts
Is it free to make a podcast transcript here?
Yes, and there’s no account to create. Transcribe 3 episodes a day, up to 30 minutes of each, and download the transcript in as many formats as you like.
Can I get a transcript of a podcast I didn’t make?
If you have the episode’s audio file, yes: many podcast websites offer a download link. For shows on Apple Podcasts, the app may already have one: touch and hold the episode, then tap View Transcript.
How long can the episode be?
The first 30 minutes of each file are transcribed; a longer episode stops there, and the page tells you. Export the episode in parts to cover the rest, or use NoteOwl on a Mac, which transcribes episodes of any length.
Does the transcript say who is talking?
No. It’s one stream of timed paragraphs. A pause of a second and a half or more starts a new paragraph, which often matches a change of speaker, so names are quick to add as you edit. NoteOwl on a Mac labels every speaker for you.
Does it work for a video podcast?
Yes. Drop the MP4 or MOV and the converter transcribes its soundtrack. Download SRT or VTT to put captions on the full video, timed to the second.
Is an unreleased episode kept anywhere?
No. Short pieces of its sound travel over a secure connection to a cloud AI transcription service, which transcribes them and then throws them away. NoteOwl stores no audio and no text, so nothing from an unpublished episode stays with us.
Can it transcribe a podcast that isn’t in English?
Yes. The spoken language is detected every half minute or so, so a show in Spanish, Hindi or Japanese comes back in that language, and a bilingual episode follows each switch. The main language is named when it finishes.
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Related
- AI transcription for podcastersEpisodes imported and transcribed speaker by speaker on your Mac, show notes from the Podcast Show Notes template, SRT subtitles; nothing uploaded
- Podcast show notes templateA podcast show notes template to copy, what each section holds, an example, and how NoteOwl writes show notes from an episode
- Subtitle generatorTurn a recording into an SRT subtitle file with timecodes and speaker names, on your Mac
Episodes into show notes, privately on your Mac
Free to download. Runs entirely on your Mac.
macOS 26 or later · Apple Silicon (M1 or newer) · 16 GB memory minimum, 24 GB recommended
About NoteOwl
NoteOwl is private AI meeting notes and memory for the Mac. It captures meetings without a bot joining the call, labels every speaker, writes summaries and action items, and builds a memory of every conversation that you can chat with — fully offline, because the speech recognition and the AI run on the Mac itself. Dictation into any app is free; Pro is a one-time purchase.
NoteOwl pricing: what’s free and what Pro adds
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