Voice to text on Cell Phone

@codyk

I have a Samsung S21 and yes, there are many app’s available. I use Innocaption+ for phone calls. Once you register they assign a special number but you don’t have to give that number to anyone. Look up the directions from your carrier to have your cell phone number automatically transferred to the Innocaption + number. When you get a call on your cell and pick up you get captions of the conversation which you can keep for as long as you want. You also have the option to both hear and read simultaneously what the speaker is saying. All voicemail is captioned. Instructions are easy and Innocaption’s customer service is outstanding. I use it constantly. There is no delay and no need to inform the other person you are reading their words…also very accurate. Score that I had the visual voicemail from my carrier which I no longer need. I also have this installed on my desktop computer and IPad in case my phone ever got lost.

I also use Live Transcribe app available only on Androids for everyday face to face conversations. Some people have trouble with this…not that accurate but a great help and it keeps conversations for 3 days.

The best speech to text app is Otter, which I have and use occasionally. I use the free version which has limited minutes. There is a paid version. It was originally set up for business meetings.

Go to your play store and search for speech to text apps. There are so many. I would download some and try them out…most are free.

I live in a populated area and some users who live in remote areas have a problem not being able to get Live Transcribe or other apps.

I love Android phones and this particular Galaxy21 has an outstanding microphone. Please ask me for any help you need if you decide to go with any of the ones I have mentioned. I have personally had great luck with Live Transcribe and use it in Doctor’s offices. I can use Otter in the waiting room and, most times, it will pick up someone calling my name. You can also set Live Transcribe to vibrate if some mentions your name…in my case Mary seems to sound like a lot of other words so it will vibrate for that also.

FL Mary

I have not found Otter to be of much use in difficult hearing environments (high ceilings, echoes, etc.). I have an iPhone.

Thank you for sharing all this information, Mary. The mere concept of speech to text was a dream not all that long ago. Now that it's here, we hear people complaining that it isn't perfect! Kind of like hearing aids and other technology. Research and development is constantly looking at ways to improve all the things that help us, and they do get better and better!

So happy to be living in times when such help is available for those of us with hearing loss. On diagnoses back in the 60s, I was told that NOTHING would ever be available to help me with the progressive hearing loss I was diagnosed with at age 21. Decades later I benefit from hearing aids, cochlear implants and other technology that works with them.

Aren't we lucky?!!

@ner

I am not surprised by your comment regarding difficult hearing situations but honestly have not tried Otter in other than a normal setting. I will make it a point to do so. I do know it was intended for business meetings originally.
I know that, generally , any of my speech to text apps perform poorly or not at all in crowded noisy venues. I doubt there are any on the market currently that will perform well. My Live Transcribe app indicates “crowd” when it doesn’t work even when held close to the speaker’s mouth.

I am thankful for what they do in all other areas and try to avoid noisy environments but we cannot always do that. We didn’t have any of these options not so long ago and we are lucky for what we have including assisted devices and CIs as @julieo4 said.

I think we will see hologram type captions in front of speakers before there are any breakthroughs in cell regeneration. And God Bless all the live captioners and researchers who will one day make “hearing loss” a thing of the past.

FL Mary

@julieo4 yes, we are indeed lucky 🍀

I have an iphone which does a good job translating speech to written.
I also have a caption call devise that translates (telephone call) speech to visual. its free. and you get what you pay for if you know what i mean.

To awlist
You say that your iphone does a good job of translating speech to written. Is that part of the iphone options or do you use an app? Curious as I have an iphone and need captioning.

on iphone try going to -settings - accessibility - hearing - RTT/TTY and then "turn on" .

Chuf2
Many thanks. I don’t use my iphone much for calls as at home have a Captel phone but this could be useful. Not sure how that information escaped me. Could you save me some time and please tell me how it works? Does it caption me as well as the caller for example?

@barbarat

I am going to jump in here and tell you to go to your play store on your phone and download Innocaption+…..a free app developed by Gaudelet University
that has been around a while. Briefly you can forward all your calls to this app which will caption the voice of anyone who calls you (not your voice). You have to register…you are assigned a phone number. Follow your carriers instructions on how to forward calls to your cell to this number. All your contacts are transferred over automatically. You can answer and make calls using this app and it had visual voicemail. You can keep records of all your conversations for as long as you like and it’s very accurate. There are instructions online and great support from Innocaption. I got rid of my old Captel and have also loaded this app on my IPad and desktop Mac. I have an Android phone…it works on all phones. While you are in the play store also browse the many speech to text apps for everyday conversations…not perfect but some are good.
Please feel free to ask any and all questions. Innocaption + is fairly intuitive and they have been refining and tweaking over the years.

FL Mary