Here’s a secret: I’m on a mission to make my life easier. You too, perhaps. For me, as a writer, one of the most draining, most reliably tedious jobs is transcribing interviews. Maybe you need to turn what was said in meetings into usable notes. Students have the same challenge, to make helpful versions of lectures. I’m on the hunt for the best solution to this problem. And Plaud Note may be it.
Mostly, I’ve been loyal to a Google Pixel 8 Pro smartphone and its sensational Recorder app. Nothing else has come close until now. I record interviews and watch (with a small sense of awe) as the voices are transcribed in real time on the Pixel display. It gets plenty of stuff wrong, but it does it on-device, fast, and tidying it up is a quick process. Plus, you can access all your recordings online, both in audible and textual formats.
Then, I saw the Plaud Note. Plaud—say it to rhyme with cloud—is a company that began as a Kickstarter last year and it’s now on general sale. The Plaud Note is a slim, metal device that’s no bigger than a credit card, and barely any thicker. It looks slick and classy and has excellent build quality. The ridged front and smooth back make it pleasingly tactile. Choose between three colors: black, silver and starlight.
While it can fit in your wallet, you’re better off using the supplied magnetic case, not least because it has MagSafe compatibility so will stick effortlessly to the back of suitable iPhones. Other phones with Qi2 compatibility will also work.
This system means you can record phone calls with the Plaud Note just by snapping it into place and sliding the record mode to phone call setting. Note that recording phone calls is not legal everywhere so check the situation where you are. In some states you need all parties’ consent and anyway, that’s only polite, even in places where only one party’s consent is required.
To operate the Plaud Note, you select the recording mode (phone call or note recording) and long-press the button. A light shows it’s recording. For phone recordings, with the device attached to the back of my iPhone, through its case, it recorded the call with great clarity.
For voice notes, you can hold the Plaud Note or place it on the table. Either way, the microphones are good and have picked up the audio well every time I’ve used it. The company says it has noise-cancellation
When you’re finished, the Plaud Note uploads the recording to your phone in the Plaud app. It needs to be near to the phone and the app must be open.
From here, it uploads the recording for transcription and summarization. It works brilliantly, returning the finished transcription and summary in moments.
When you buy the Plaud Note, it comes with a free Starter plan giving you 300 minutes of transcription and summarization each month, done with GPT-4o. I have been very impressed with the results.
There are also paid subscription levels with more minutes of transcription and extra features such as labels for each speaker and more advanced templates for your summaries alongside the dozen offerings which come as standard. These include Meeting Note, Speech, Consulting Meeting and Lecture. It has 64GB of storage and the battery lasts up to 60 days on standby, Plaud says.
The results are excellent. Sure, there are still bits you need to tidy up, but it’s simple to share the audio and transcript so you can edit the text on a laptop, for instance.
Are there downsides? Well, that impressive in-real-time transcription the Pixel offers is not here, with the handy capability of checking what someone said earlier while you’re still in the meeting. And there’s something especially good about everything being done on-device, as it is on the Pixel.
But I only have two other cavils with the Plaud Note. It’s a tight fit in the MagSafe-compatible case so sliding it out takes practice. Mostly, I hook my fingernail under the switch for phone call recording to get it out. The other issue is the charging cable, which is bespoke. But I understand why: it’s just too thin for USB-C to fit it, and the cable is neatly designed so you can charge it in its case.
Verdict
The Plaud Note is a wonderfully slick, impressively slim device that’s so light you barely know it’s there. It looks great and works brilliantly. I’d love it if the transcription could be on-device but it’s quick and effective, so waiting for the transcription and summary is hardly a chore. Overall, it’s a show-stopper.
It costs $239, though it’s currently reduced by $40 to $199 for Prime Day. Available from plaud.ai.
