Verbit review

In the world of transcription, platforms are typically AI-based or use human transcribers, and the service is just a means to organise the work distribution.

Verbit, almost uniquely, is both of these things simultaneously.

Software AI technology mulls over the audio and does its best to interpret what is said, and then once that stage is complete, it is passed to humans to pick up any errors.

Combining 35,000 or more humans with an artificial intelligence model standards the best chance of accurate transcription, one might reasonably assume.

But, there is more to Verbit than just a well-considered methodology.

Verbit: Plans and pricing

Verbit has tailored speech-to-text packages designed to best serve a specific market. These include plans for Corporate Learning, Court Reporting. Education and Media Production. It also offers Audio description and live transcription services.

The technology that is used on each of these is the same, and the only major difference is that some of these have inherent captioning with timestamping, whereas for other services this isn’t included. Because the captions are provided with timestamps, it is possible to use them as video subtitles.

But the critical questions that we normally answer in this section aren’t available, as Vebit has decided that it offers an enterprise-focused service where they don’t provide a set cost.

Some companies don’t like this approach since it’s tough to know if the service being offered is good value when compared to the same service provided to another business.

What Verbit will say is that the cost is ‘competitive’ when compared with exclusively human transcription, even if they’re not prepared to say what that cost is, and that volume users can expect a discount.

Verbit: Features

The Verbit platform gives you access to sophisticated voice recognition AI technology, which speeds up transcription and produces results faster than a human-only transcription service.

When you use Verbit to transcribe audio, its AI algorithms adapt to the sound file's unique signatures by creating acoustic, linguistic, and contextual event models. Verbit is able to decrease background noise, distinguish accents, and pick out terms linked to current news issues thanks to these features.

You can keep track of your jobs throughout the transcription process thanks to real-time status information available through the Verbit Cloud portal. Verbit also has interfaces with a variety of third-party services, allowing you to easily distribute the transcriptions.

Verbit: Setup 

Submitting a transcription request to Verbit is simple and requires no technical experience. The first step is to contact the Verbit staff via the Contact Us web page to create an account. Verbit will offer a rate for your transcription job based on your chat and, if you accept that rate, will create an account for you.

All you have to do to start a transcription is submit an audio file to the Verbit Cloud account you were provided. Verbit's AI technology will transcribe it, and the findings will be double-checked by two human transcribers. You may download the finished work in a suitable file format as soon as the procedure is completed.

This sounds very straightforward, and for the most part, it is.

Verbit does also offer a live captioning service, but this is a separate product with its own pricing structure and methodologies.

Verbit: Interface 

The Verbit interface is a clean and minimalistic design that is easy to use.

Located on the user's home screen is a list of all the transcription jobs and their current status. At a glance, it can be determined what’s completed, awaiting oversight or was deemed ‘Inaudible’ by the human transcribers.

From this web page, it is possible to add new files, either audio or video, and if you run into a snag, a helpful chat portal is available where a support agent can provide help.

The interface isn’t designed for huge numbers of documents, but it is workable for the requirements of a single user.

Verbit: Performance

The very best human transcription claims an accuracy of 99% and the best AI technology we’ve tested achieved scores in the 95-98% range.

When processing our test audio, an accuracy level of nearer 99% was achieved across a wide range of content, including public lectures and court proceedings. That’s an impressive performance since the speed at which these files were transcribed exceeded that allocated to human-only services by some considerable degree.

One aspect of the Verbit approach that probably is a major contributor to the accuracy level is that two human transcribers are used as a catch-all for errors. Everyone can have a less than perfect day, and often the complaints that human-only services get are due to people not being at their best or issues relating to accents.

With two people in the chain of command beyond the AI processing, it is much less likely that a file would be transcribed with major errors and then returned to the client as completed.

Another unique Verbit facility is available when captioning is included. Timestamping is created on a per-word basis, allowing the words in the caption to be highlighted as they are spoken.

Verbit: Support

A service that involves enterprise customers is usually expected to deliver a high level of support, and many businesses see this as what it pays to get.

The reputation of Verbit is very high in this area, as all accounts are allocated a dedicated customer success manager as the primary point of contact. Obviously, managers don’t work 24/7, so as a fall-back, Verbit has a live chat service that is available around the clock that can answer the majority of queries directly.

For those looking to better utilise an account they already have, Verbit has created a series of webinars that cover how transcription can help in different industries to deliver the commercial advantages it can.

Verbit: Final verdict

The special mix of machine intelligence and human intervention is a winning formula for providing the most accurate levels of transcription.

Verbit not only provides exceptionally accurate transcriptions but it also supplies you with handy tools for captioning movies, searching for important phrases, and sharing your content via external app integrations.

What we can’t say is if the price of that service is the right one for your business. As that’s the part of this jigsaw, you only get by first talking to Verbit.

The competition

There aren’t other hybrid systems that exactly fit the Verbit approach, which leaves us either comparing it to entirely human services or fully AI processes.

Where this service beat even the best human transcription is in the speed, with a turnaround time of around four hours. That’s faster than most even with express costings, where the best services generally start at about 6 hours.

GoTranscript has a 6-hour turnaround option, and it also transcribes more languages than Verbit. What GoTranscript, and other services lack are the features specifically for court depositions and lecture captioning. These are invaluable to those that need those types of transcription, and Verbit offers these and so much more.

Find out more about Verbit's competition in our guide to the Best speech-to-text software.