WhatsApp Voice Message Transcription Is a Saviour From Hoarse Voice Notes

Have you ever received a five-minute-long voice note from a friend or relative on WhatsApp and wondered what to do with it? Should you play it at 2x speed or leave it unread? The second option could be dangerous for your peace of mind in case of an emergency text.

Let’s imagine another scenario: you're with your parents and you receive a voice note from a friend or a close one. You know it could be a silly message and playing it at full volume could be risky. However, your curious mind wants to listen to it right away and sadly, you don’t have earbuds. Ah, sad moment, right?

But hurrah! WhatsApp has listened to your concerns and solved this issue by introducing the Voice Message Transcription feature globally. This feature lets you read what your overly chatty friends refuse to text.

Finally, the days of playing voice notes at 10 per cent volume under the desk during meetings are gone. You can now know exactly what they’re rambling about without risking public embarrassment.

📣 transcripts for voice messages are rolling out now! so when you can’t listen right away, you have the option to read them

voice messages transcripts are generated on your phone so that no one, not even WhatsApp, can hear or read them 🔒 rolling out in select languages

— WhatsApp (@WhatsApp) November 21, 2024

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WhatsApp voice message transcription is here

After enabling this feature, the recipient can view transcriptions of voice messages they receive. The new voice message transcription feature is similar to other transcription software that converts voice messages into text after downloading the voice notes received by users. As a user, now you have the flexibility to read all the content instead of finding a perfect place to listen to WhatsApp audio notes.

WhatsApp has also clarified that the voice message transcriptions are processed directly on the user’s device, ensuring privacy and fast processing.

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How to activate the feature on your phone

This feature is available for Android, iOS and other platforms. By default, WhatsApp voice message transcription is disabled and must be enabled manually by the user. Follow these steps to get this feature:

Navigate to Settings, tap Chats and toggle the ‘Voice Message Transcription’ option on or off.

When enabling the feature, users can choose the transcript language. Currently, it supports English, Russian, Portuguese and Spanish. However, Indian languages like Hindi, Tamil, Marathi, etc., are missing from the list.

This feature can be very useful in multiple scenarios and we are expecting support for other Indian languages as well.

But don’t get too excited—this magical feature can only transcribe audio to text, so it can’t detect the lies of your friend, such as, "Buddy, I will reach within five minutes!" But yes, now your ears won’t need to tolerate his hoarse voices.

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