Live Transcribe & Notification

Research at Google

About this app

Live Transcribe & Sound Notifications makes everyday conversations and surrounding sounds more accessible among people who are deaf and hard of hearing, using just your Android phone.

On most devices, you can open Live Transcribe & Sound Notifications with these steps:
1. Open your device's Settings app
2. Tap Accessibility
3. Depending on which feature you'd like to use, tap Live Transcribe or Sound Notifications

You can also use the accessibility button, gesture, or Quick Settings to start Live Transcribe or Sound Notifications (https://g.co/a11y/shortcutsFAQ).

Real-time transcriptions
• Get transcriptions in real-time in over 120 languages and dialects. Add custom words that you use frequently, like names or household items.
• Set your phone to vibrate when someone says your name.
• Type responses in your conversation.
• Use external microphones found in wired headsets, Bluetooth headsets, and USB mics for better audio reception.
• On foldable phones, show transcriptions and typed responses on the outside screen so it's easier to communicate with others.
• Choose to save transcriptions for 3 days. Saved transcriptions will stay on your device for 3 days so you can copy and paste them elsewhere. By default, transcriptions are not saved.

Sound Notifications
• Get notified about important sounds around you, like when a smoke alarm beeps or baby cries.
• Add custom sounds to get notified when your appliances beep.
• Review sounds from the past 12 hours to check what was happening around you.

Requirements:
• Android 12 and up

Live Transcribe & Sound Notifications was made in collaboration with Gallaudet University, the premier Deaf and hard of hearing university in the US.

Help & feedback
• To provide feedback and get product updates, join the Accessible Google Group at https://g.co/a11y/forum
• For help using Live Transcribe & Sound Notifications, connect with us at https://g.co/disabilitysupport

Permissions notice
Microphone: Live Transcribe and Sound Notifications needs microphone access to transcribe the speech and sounds around you. The audio is not stored after transcriptions or recognized sounds are processed.
Notifications: Sound Notifications features require notifications access in order to notify you of sounds.
Nearby devices: Live Transcribe needs access to nearby devices to connect with your Bluetooth microphones.

Ratings and reviews

Good quality transcription, but a complete lack of features to edit, export, or properly save make it little more than a novelty for transcription, and more an app for communicating with the hard of hearing. Such a shame as it would be great if only for the ability to easily get the text into another app (you can copy and paste, but if you stop speaking for more than a couple of minutes, it starts a new transcription and the old one is lost (even if you 'saved' it)).

Wanting more. It picks up what you're saying really well, better than any other transcriber app I have used, including the Dragon Anywhere app. But it has no means with which to do anything with the words you have transcribed. You can copy and paste, and add to those words using the keyboard. But you can't change the text you've entered via your voice. You can't even delete or adjust a word that has been incorrectly transcribed. So it is very promising but needs a lot more before it's useful.

This app is insanely helpful. I enjoy writing, so what I use it for is recording thoughts and story ideas as I go through my busy day. I love how easy it is to select all of the text and copy it to a separate file for later editing, and that it has an offline mode. My only wish is that I could use it with my phone screen off and/or in the background, so that when another app opens and I don't realize it the recording won't stop. My battery would appreciate it, too.

What’s new

• Support pinch-to-zoom on the transcription.
• Support export transcriptions.