Top 10 Best Speech Recognition Software for Business in 2024

Of all the labor-intensive business tasks out there, manual audio transcription takes the cake. 

SMBs cannot afford to waste time on a monotonous job that already has a high margin of human error—especially when there’s an AI solution in the market. 

AI-powered speech recognition services can save you from fast-forwarding through hours of audio to find what you’re looking for. These tools instantly perform speech-to-audio transcription and boost your business’s productivity.

Need real-time transcriptions of business meetings? Or maybe you want to turn podcasts into blog posts? Either way, speech recognition software is 20-30x faster than manual transcription. 

In this article, we review the top 10 speech recognition software in the market for small business owners. These AI tools have higher accuracy and better performance than default dictation software on operating systems like Apple MacOS (Siri) and Windows 11 (Cortana).

Let’s dive in.

Let’s look at the top 10 speech recognition software for businesses in 2024.

1. Cockatoo

Cockatoo homepage

Cockatoo is an AI transcription service that’s high in speed and accuracy. This simple tool lets you upload your music and videos and instantly generates transcripts you can export in multiple formats. Cockatoo is trained through machine learning—so it can perform voice recognition despite different accents and background noise. 

Pricing

Cockatoo has a free plan that allows up to two 30-minute uploads a month. 

For more uploads, you’ll need to subscribe to one of the pricing plans:

• Pro: $15 per month billed annually. Transcribe up to 10,000 minutes of audio or video monthly 

• Business: $29 per month billed annually. Unlimited minutes of transcription

Pros

• High-speed transcription, 1 hour of audio is transcribed in 2-3 minutes. 

• Uses machine learning to deliver 99% accuracy

• Built-in text editor to edit your transcriptions

• Supports 90+ languages

• Export as captions (SRT format) or text files

• Includes timestamps

• Includes punctuation

• High level of user data privacy through cryptography technology

• More affordable than similar tools in the market

Cockatoo user review on Trustpilot

Cons

• No live dictation features

• User interface can be slow and glitchy at times

• No real-time transcription

Cockatoo user review on Trustpilot

Best for

If you have a bunch of recordings you need transcribed, Cockatoo is a great choice. But if you’re looking for more advanced virtual meeting features like real-time transcription, multiple speaker recognition, or summarizing data—you’re be better off with an advanced tool like AssemblyAI.

2. AssemblyAI

AssemblyAI homepage

AssemblyAI is a robust speech recognition and transcription software built for enterprises.

It has highly accurate models to convert audio and video files into text, summarize meetings, and extract valuable insights and interpretations.

Pricing

AssemblyAI follows a time-based pricing structure, allowing you to pay only for the time you’ve used the software. 

To get an accurate estimate of its pricing rates, you can look at its pricing calculator as well:

• Core Transcription: $0.650016 per hour. Includes speech recognition and speech diarization (identifying who said what with multiple speakers) 

• Real-time Transcription: $0.75024 per hour. Speech recognition with <600 ms of latency

Pros

• Easy to set up and implement in daily workflows

• Impressive accuracy

• Helpful and fast customer support 

• Multiple Speaker Recognition 

• Profanity filters

• Can include custom vocabulary 

AssemblyAI review on G2.com

Cons

• Isn’t affordable for low usage

• Inadequate multilingual support 

Assembly AI review on G2.com

Best for

Assembly AI is great for real-time transcription during live lectures and interviews, with its high level of accuracy and speed. However, if your SMB requires multilingual support, we suggest you try Amazon Transcribe instead.

 3. Amazon Transcribe

Amazon Transcribe homepage

Amazon Transcribe is a free, cloud-based automatic speech recognition service. Apart from transcription, SMBs can also use this with voice-activated systems and content indexing functionality.

Amazon Transcribe also uses machine learning algorithms to improve the level of accuracy while supporting a wide range of audio formats.

Pricing

Amazon Transcribes prices differ according to usage and your AWS region. However, it provides 60 minutes of free usage per month for 12 months.

Look at the detailed pricing page for further information:

• Tier 1: $0.02400 for the first 250,000 minutes

• Tier 2: $0.01500 for the next 750,000 minutes

• Tier 3: $0.01020 for the next 4,000,000 minutes

• Tier 4: $0.00780 for over 5,000,000 minutes 

Use its pricing calculator to get a more accurate estimate.

Pros

• Supports over 31 languages

• Affordable price 

• Easy to set up

• High accuracy rates

User review of Transcribe on G2.com

Cons

• Custom vocabulary is not as good as other software options

• A proofreading round is recommended, because of errors in punctuation 

User review of Transcribe on G2.com

Best for

Apart from being a decently accurate and affordable speech recognition tool, Amazon Transcribe’s vast language support gives it an upper hand over other software. If you need multiple languages for international customer support or video files, then consider this dictation software.

4. Nuance Dragon

Nuance Dragon homepage

Nuance Dragon is a powerful tool for real-time voice dictation and recognition, with a documentation speed 3x more than manual typing. Dragon Speech is versatile, providing speech recognition solutions across different platforms and industries, ranging from healthcare, law enforcement, and legal to transcribing audio for business professionals.

Pricing

• Dragon Professional: One-time payment of $699, updated to support Windows 11/Office 2021

• Dragon Legal: One-time payment of $799 

• Dragon Anywhere Mobile: $15/month, including a 1-week free trial for mobile devices. Available on Android and iPhone iOS

Pros

• Picks up on business-specific jargon quickly

• High accuracy rates

• Supports systems above Windows 10

• Extremely versatile platform across industries

• Uses deep learning to understand accents and voice inflections

• Integrates across a wide range of applications

• Has tutorials on how to use the software

User review on Trust Radius

Cons

• It’s challenging to edit already transcribed files, in case of errors

• Accuracy rate gets affected by fast talkers

• Large software that may affect the performance of your system

• Higher in cost 

User review on Trust Radius

Best for

If you have a higher budget for a tool that eliminates manual typing completely, then consider Nuance Dragon. It can analyze large volumes of documentation and dictation, with a decent accuracy rate. However, if you prefer lighter AI-powered software for online meetings and calls, consider Deepgram instead. 

5. IBM Watson Speech to Text

IBM Watson homepage

If you’re looking for a transcription tool in the customer care domain, then IBM Watson’s Speech to Text transcription software is secure and highly customizable. IBM Watson has low latency or minimum delay in processes, and accurate speech recognition and customer support assistance.

Pricing

IBM Watson offers a free trial of 500 minutes of speech recognition per month along with 38 pre-trained models. 

It also has several pricing plans according to your use:

• Lite: 500 minutes per month for free, with no customization options

• Plus: Subscribe to two tiers 

• Up to 1 to 999,999 minutes of audio, $0.02 per minute 

• 1,000,000+ minutes of audio, $0.01 per minute

• Premium: The plus plan with more security, contact an IBM representative for details

Pros

• Great accuracy 

• Real-time mode

• Provides high-quality files

• Detects tone of voice, abbreviations, and numbers

Review of IBM Watson by a user on G2.com

Cons

• Supports 11 languages

• Slow integration

• Not compatible with IOS, Android, and Desktop devices

Review of IBM Watson by a user on G2.com

Best for

If you need voice typing, IBM Watson uses highly accurate word recognition to detect specific phrases and tonality. This is great for meeting transcriptions, especially with features like real-time mode.

6. Deepgram

DeepGram homepage

Deepgram is a great, and cost-effective option for speech-to-text API tools and audio intelligence. It’s a voice control tool with high speed and accuracy rate, making it perfect for live-meeting transcribing, extracting valuable insights, and summarizing conversational audio files like telesales calls. 

Pricing

Deepgram’s speech recognition technology has affordable pricing plans, including a pay-as-you-go option that doesn’t require a credit card:

• Pay As You Go: No minimums or expirations, including $200 of free credit, for all Deepgram models 

• Growth: Annual billing of $4,000 to $10,000 with pre-paid credits for a year

• Exclusive: Custom-trained speech-to-text models for larger volumes of data, along with extra discounts. Contact Deepgram Support for pricing

Pros

• Transcribes real-time or an hour of pre-recorded audio in just 12 seconds, great for larger files

• Speech diarization (automatically identifying different speakers) and audio intelligence

• $200 coverage in its free trial

• Easier integration with a user-friendly interface

• Privacy-focused software, keeping all transcriptions confidential

User review on G2.com

Cons

• Accuracy rates drop with languages apart from English

• Can’t integrate with it via a Software Development Kit (SDK)

• Unresponsive customer support 

User review on G2.com

Best for

If you want to transcribe lengthy meetings or telecommunication calls quickly and for a fraction of the price, then Deepgram API is an option to consider.

7. Voicegain

Voicegain homepage

Voicegain is a flexible, cloud-based speech-to-text platform developers use to build voice-enabled apps and chatbots. Apart from its affordability, Voicegain also provides AI transcription services for recorded and online meetings like Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet.

Voicegain claims a 93% accuracy rate on batch and streaming audio. This tool has been trained on more than 30,000 hours of audio and offers an SLA guarantee on accuracy. 

Pricing

Its pricing plans provide free credit and pay-as-you-go usage, with no credit card required:

• Developer products: Ranging from $0.18-$0.36, along with $50 worth of free credit

• Transcribe: Provides three pricing plans

• Basic: $0 for 300 minutes/month 

• Individual: $20 for 3000 minutes/month 

• Team: $80 for 15000 minutes/month

• Enterprise: For enterprise prices and features, contact Voicegain Support

Pros

• Pay only for use, at just $0.75 per hour for valuable calls and audio files

• Trained on 30K+ hours of audio

• No dip in accuracy for streaming audio

• Multilingual support in English, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Hindi and Korean

• Can train your model on company data

Cons

• Different models for real-time and offline transcription

• Limited features for meeting recordings

Best for

Voicegain specializes in accurate real-time processing, making it ideal for call centers and communication industries. 

8. Microsoft Azure Cognitive Services for Speech

Microsoft Azure home page

Microsoft Azure AI Speech offers both text-to-speech and speech-to-text API as a part of its cloud-computing platform. From building voice-enabled apps and transcribing audio to converting texts to audio, Azure AI is a great scalable voice AI software for SMBs across industries.

Pricing

Azure gives its users $200 of credit along with 12 months of selective access to its services.

Here are Azure’s pricing plans:

• Free: 5 audio hours free per month 10,000 free transactions for speaker identification, verification, and voice profile storage

• Pay-as-you-go: $1 per hour, along with $0.30 for any added features like diarization per hour

• Commitment Tiers: $0.80 per hour

Pros

• Great multilingual support with speech translation for languages like Spanish and French

• High-quality output files

• User-friendly

• Offers both speech-to-text and text-to-speech

• API for easy integration into applications

• Free plan comes with credit worth $200

• Seamless speaker recognition

• No-code user experience

• High data security, does not store speech input

User review of Azure AI on G2.com

Cons

• More expensive than other speech recognition tools

• Not the best customer support

• Inaccuracy in output across different accents

User review of Azure AI on G2.com

Best for

While Windows Speech Recognition offers a plethora of services, the accuracy, and vocal library for the text-to-speech API is the user’s favorite. However, if you aren’t using other Azure services and your use cases are limited to speech-to-text transcription, aimfor cheaper software.

9. PicoVoice

PicoVoice home page

PicoVoice offers a complete set of modular voice AI engines. By providing a wide range of cross-platform Software Development Kits (SDKs), this developer-first software is ideal for speech-to-text transcription, noise-cancellation for recorded files, and natural-language processing for voice commands. 

Pricing

Instead of a trial, PicoVoice’s pricing plan includes a forever free plan with limited audio hours, making its features accessible and affordable for everyone. 

For more hours, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid plan:

• Forever Free: $0/month–25 hours of voice recognition, suppression, real-time speech-to-text/Supports up to 3 active users

• Developer: $500/month–for 1000 hours per month, supporting 100 active users, billed annually

• Enterprise: Starting at$2500/month. Contact PicoVoice support for an accurate quote.

Pros

• Higher security with ensured encryption and privacy

• Affordable and accessible

• Customizable to your business model

• Suitable for smart devices

• Provides multilingual support of up to 8+ languages like French, German, Japanese and Spanish 

• Has unique services like Human Voice Activity Detection, and an AI-powered Public Speaking Coach

Cons

• Doesn’t support Android, Apple iOS, and only works on Web (works best on Chrome browser)

Best for

PicoVoice is customizable and lightweight in comparison to other speech recognition software like Nuance Dragon, and a great add-on feature if you’re working on an AI development project. If resource efficiency is important, PicoVoice is the option for you.

10. Telesign Voice API

Telesign voice API homepage

Telesign’s Voice API is a great tool for boosting an SMB’s communication and customer support by helping them design Application-to-Person (A2P), Person-to-Person (P2P), and Person-to-Application (P2A) messaging. Telesign’s shining feature is its high level of security voice authentication, making it perfect for businesses in the finance and e-commerce sectors. 

Pricing

Telesign Voice API also offers a pay-as-you-go usage feature. You’ll have to contact their sales team for prices, especially for large-volume packages.

Pros

• Great for security applications, such as voice authentication 

• Identifies patterns and insights from transcripted calls

• Secure and encrypted interactions with customers

• Customize and personalize text-to-speech messages to customers

• Reduces authentication process costs via voice-delivered OTPs

• Makes communication effective with Interactive Voice Response (IVR) flows 

Cons

• Use cases are limited to digital security

• Can’t be used for basic speech-to-text transcriptions

Best for

Telesign’s main focus is digital security applications. SMBs in the finance and e-commerce sectors that require vigorous security, voice-based authentication, fraud prevention, and effective customer communications should definitely opt for Telesign.

Work with an AI expert today

When you integrate a speech recognition SaaS tool into your workflow, it can boost business productivity and reduce human error. However, these tools can be expensive in the long run. By hiring a professional artificial intelligence freelancer, you can get affordable speech recognition services without the hassle of expensive annual subscriptions. 

Since you’re incorporating AI into your audio processes, it’s worth looking into how you can leverage AI across the board. While ChatGPT has certain limitations, most businesses are missing out on the tool’s spectrum of capabilities. Work with a ChatGPT expert to learn how to talk to GPT, train ChatGPT applications, and even use ChatGPT plugins in your business. 

Sign up on Fiverr and hire a freelance speech recognition AI expert today.