A voice to text app with custom prompts you write yourself

sAInote, an AI voice-to-text app, lets you write your own instruction once, save it, and apply it to any recording — a voice to text app with custom prompts rather than one fixed summary style. The mode is called Pro Assistant, and it sits alongside Quick Note, which returns a verbatim transcript, and Smart Summary, which returns a cleaned, structured version. Pro Assistant requires a Pro plan. Your instruction is stored on your account, so the same kind of recording comes back the same way every time.

Record your first note 15 minutes free, once, with no account. Pro Assistant needs Pro.

What people actually save as an assistant

Meeting minutes with decisions and actions: Save an instruction that asks for a short summary first, then decisions, then action items with an owner and a date each. Record the meeting, apply it, and the notes arrive in that order every time.
A drafted reply in your own tone: Describe how you write to customers — a plain greeting, short sentences, no jargon, one clear next step — and save it. Talk through what happened on the call and get a draft reply back written that way.
A structured case or clinical note: Keep an instruction that lays a dictation out in your field's own headings: background, findings, assessment, plan. Dictate after the appointment and the note comes back under the same headings, in the same sequence, each time.
An article outline from a walk-and-talk: Save an instruction that turns rambling into a skeleton: a working title, three to five sections, one line of intent under each. Talk while you walk, apply it, and edit an outline instead of a blank page.
You can describe the instruction out loud: You do not have to write it by hand. Describe out loud what the assistant should do and sAInote drafts the instruction from that description. Each successful generation deducts 5 minutes from your balance, whether or not you save it.
Written once, reused everywhere: A saved instruction belongs to your account, not to one recording. Apply it to next week's call and the week after, on web, iPhone, iPad or Mac, and the output keeps the same shape.

How to use your own AI instructions on a recording

1

Sign in and open Pro

Sign in passwordlessly with a 6-digit emailed code, a magic link, or Apple or Google. Pro Assistant is on the Pro plan; Quick Note and Smart Summary are open to everyone, guests included.
2

Write the instruction, or describe it

Type the instruction in your own words, or describe out loud what you want and let sAInote draft it. Each successful generation costs 5 minutes whether you keep the result or discard it.
3

Save it with a name you will recognise

Name the assistant something you will find again — "client call minutes", "case note". It syncs with your account, so the same assistant is waiting on web, iPhone, iPad and Mac.
4

Record or upload, then pick the assistant

Record in the browser or the apps, or upload a WAV, MP3, M4A, MP4, WebM, OGG or Opus file up to 64 MB. Choose Pro Assistant and select your saved instruction.
5

Read the output and tighten the wording

Check what comes back. If the shape is off, adjust the instruction — name the sections, cut what you do not want — and the fix carries forward to every later recording.

What a voice to text app with custom prompts actually does

A voice to text app with custom prompts does two things a plain transcriber does not: it accepts an instruction you wrote, and it keeps that instruction for next time. In sAInote that instruction is a Pro Assistant. You write it in your own words — what to pull out, what to ignore, what order to put it in, what to call each part — and save it under a name.

From then on it is simply a choice at processing time. Record on the web with nothing installed, on iPhone or iPad, or through the macOS app's global hotkey Quick Capture, set to Control+Option+Command+N by default. Then pick the assistant you want applied. The same instruction can run against a two-minute voice memo and a ninety-minute workshop.

The instruction lives on your account rather than on one device, so something written at your desk is there on your phone the next morning. Pro Assistant is available on the Pro plan only. Quick Note and Smart Summary need no instruction at all and are available on every plan, guests included.

How this differs from a generic AI summarizer

A generic summarizer decides for you. You get a summary in the shape someone else chose, and that shape drifts between one recording and the next. When the output is going into something fixed — a ticket, a client file, a standing meeting doc — the drift costs more time than the summary saved.

A saved instruction removes the guesswork. You state the sections, the order, the tone and the level of detail once, and every recording processed with that assistant comes back matching it. Predictable structure is the whole point: you stop re-reading output to find things and start pasting it where it belongs.

It also means you can keep several assistants for different jobs — one for interviews, one for client calls, one for thinking out loud — and choose per recording. The audio is the same; the instruction decides what it becomes. Smart Summary remains there for the times you want a clean, structured version and have no particular format in mind.

Limits, plans and what it costs in minutes

Usage is measured in minutes of audio, not in number of files. A three-minute recording costs three minutes in any mode. Guests get 15 minutes, once — not monthly — with Quick Note and Smart Summary, and no saved history. A free account also gets 15 minutes once, plus searchable history that follows you across devices and matches both the transcript and the processed output.

Pro includes 360 minutes, six hours, every month. It adds Pro Assistant, Special Names (a personal spelling glossary, Pro only), long-recording handling and priority support.

Length limits apply on every plan. Anything up to 20 minutes is processed immediately. From 20 minutes to 2 hours, processing runs in the background — you can close the app and come back for it — and that range is Pro only. Two hours is the hard cap per recording; anything longer is rejected. Uploads are capped at 64 MB and accept WAV, MP3, M4A, MP4, WebM, OGG and Opus, one file at a time.

For long recordings, sAInote separates speakers and summarises in chunks, so detail from the last ten minutes survives as well as the first ten.

Writing an instruction that comes back the way you want

Be specific about structure. "Summarise this" leaves everything to the assistant. "A two-line summary, then decisions as a bulleted list, then action items with an owner and a due date each" leaves almost nothing. Naming the sections is the single biggest difference between an assistant you keep and one you rewrite after every use.

Say what to leave out as well as what to include: small talk, scheduling chatter, anything without an owner. Say how it should sound, if that matters — short sentences, no jargon, first person, the way you would write it yourself. And say what to do when something is missing, so the output does not quietly invent a decision that was never made.

If writing it out feels like work, describe it out loud instead. Talk through what the assistant should do and sAInote drafts the instruction from that description. Each successful generation deducts 5 minutes from your balance whether or not you save the result, so it pays to describe the format you want in the same breath as the job.

Questions about custom instructions

Can I use my own custom prompt in a voice to text app?

Yes. sAInote's Pro Assistant lets you write an instruction in your own words, save it to your account, and apply it to any recording afterwards. The saved instruction is reusable, so the same kind of recording comes back in the same format each time. Pro Assistant requires a Pro plan.

Is Pro Assistant included in the free plan?

No. Pro Assistant is on the Pro plan only. Free accounts and guests get the other two modes: Quick Note, a verbatim transcript with nothing added or removed, and Smart Summary, which removes filler, repairs sentences and adds headings and lists while leaving the facts unchanged.

Do I have to write the instruction myself?

No. You can describe out loud what you want the assistant to do, and sAInote drafts the instruction from that description. Each successful generation deducts 5 minutes from your balance whether or not you save the result. Both writing by hand and describing out loud are Pro features.

Can I use the same instruction on more than one recording?

Yes. A saved instruction is not tied to the recording it was written for. Apply it to any later recording on the web app, iPhone, iPad or Mac, since it syncs with your account. That reuse is the practical difference from typing a one-off request into a generic summarizer.

How long can a recording be?

Two hours is the hard cap, and anything longer is rejected. Up to 20 minutes is processed immediately on every plan. Between 20 minutes and 2 hours, processing runs in the background so you can close the app and come back, and that range is Pro only.

What audio files can I upload, and how big?

Up to 64 MB per file, in WAV, MP3, M4A, MP4, WebM, OGG or Opus. Upload one file at a time; there is no bulk queue. You can also record directly in the browser with nothing installed, or in the iPhone, iPad and macOS apps.

Can Pro Assistant translate the output as well?

No. Translation is part of Edit & Translate, which works in Smart Summary mode only. It edits and translates in one pass into roughly 35 target languages, working from the cleaned text rather than the raw transcript. Your chosen language is stored on your account across web, iPhone, iPad and Mac.

Does sAInote join meetings or connect to Zoom, Teams or Google Meet?

No. There is no meeting bot, no live transcription and no integration with any conferencing, storage or note app. sAInote records audio itself or takes a file you upload, and processing happens after the recording ends. A network connection is always required; there is no offline mode.

How do I sign in, and what happens to my audio?

Sign-in is passwordless: a 6-digit code by email, a magic link, or Sign in with Apple or Google. Audio sits in private cloud storage, never public, never indexed and not shareable by URL, and is cleaned up on a schedule after processing. You can delete your account in-app; deletion anonymises the data.

Your format, every time

Write the instruction once and the next recording — and the fifty after it — comes back in the shape you decided on. Pro Assistant is Pro only; Quick Note and Smart Summary are there for everyone else.

Record your first note