Frequently Asked Questions

Everything you need to know about Turnscribe.

Yes. The core transcription flow is 100% free — no sign-up required, no credit card, no hidden fees. Just paste a URL and get your transcription instantly. If you want AI summaries, translation, editing/export, voice dictation, batch uploads, or API/MCP access, those are part of the Basic or Pro plans.

Turnscribe supports YouTube (videos and Shorts), TikTok, Instagram Reels, Facebook, Vimeo, Dailymotion, SoundCloud, and any public video or audio URL. If it has audio, we can transcribe it.

Turnscribe automatically detects the language — no need to select it manually. It supports over 90 languages powered by OpenAI Whisper AI, including English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Hindi, Arabic, and many more.

Short videos (under 5 minutes) are transcribed in about 20–30 seconds. Longer videos are processed in order so a 30-minute video typically takes around 60-90 seconds.

Yes. The maximum duration per transcription depends on your plan — Basic and Pro support significantly longer media than the Free plan. See the exact limits for each plan on the Pricing page. For file uploads, the limit is 50 MB regardless of plan.

Yes! In addition to pasting a URL, you can now upload a local audio or video file directly from your device. Just click "Upload an audio or video file instead" below the URL input on the home page to switch to the file upload mode. Select your file, click Get Transcription, and Whisper AI will transcribe it just like any other URL. Supported formats include MP3, MP4, WAV, M4A, OGG, WEBM, and more. Maximum file size depends on your plan — see Pricing for the exact limit.

Yes! Turnscribe offers a REST API for developers and businesses, available on the Basic plan. Once you're on Basic or Pro, generate a key from your API Keys page in the dashboard and start integrating with n8n, Zapier, Make, or your own app. See the API overview and full documentation for endpoints, limits and examples.

Some videos may fail due to: age restrictions or private content, regional availability restrictions, platform rate limits (especially Instagram), or videos with no audio content. In those cases, a clear error message will explain why.

Turnscribe uses OpenAI Whisper AI, one of the most accurate speech recognition models available. Accuracy depends on audio quality, background noise, and accents, but in most cases it achieves near-human accuracy.

Basic adds AI summaries, an editor with PDF/DOCX export, voice dictation, a higher monthly quota, more storage, longer max transcription duration, and access to the REST API. Pro includes everything in Basic plus transcript translation, batch file uploads, bulk URL import, and access to the MCP server. See the full comparison on the Pricing page.

Yes, on Basic or Pro. Open a transcript with enough content and click "Generate Summary" to get a short, direct summary instead of reading the full text.

Yes, on Pro. From the transcript detail page you can translate into any of 28 supported languages. To keep costs sustainable, each transcript can be translated once per day.

Yes, on Basic or Pro. You can edit the transcript text directly and export it as a PDF or DOCX file.

Yes, on Basic or Pro. Voice dictation lets you record straight from your browser's microphone and get it transcribed — no file needed.

Yes, on Pro. You can upload several files at once from the dashboard, or submit a batch of URLs in a single request through the API.

Yes, on Pro. Turnscribe has an MCP server that any MCP-compatible AI tool can connect to — with tested setup guides for Claude Code and Claude Desktop — so your AI assistant can transcribe, summarize and translate media for you directly from the conversation.

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