Turn a lecture recording into notes with AI

A lecture recording becomes usable notes in two steps: record or upload it in sAInote, an AI voice-to-text app, then choose Smart Summary instead of a plain transcript. Quick Note gives you the words verbatim, which for an hour of speech means a wall of undifferentiated text. Smart Summary returns the same content with headings, paragraphs and lists, filler removed and broken sentences repaired, facts unchanged. Recordings up to 20 minutes are processed immediately on every plan. A full lecture of 20 minutes to 2 hours is a Pro feature and is processed in the background.

Turn a lecture into notes 15 minutes of audio free, one time, no account needed. Quick Note and Smart Summary both included.

What you get from a lecture recording

Smart Summary: The mode that makes a lecture revisable: filler removed, sentences repaired, headings, paragraphs and lists added, facts unchanged. Available on every plan, including without an account.
Quick Note: A verbatim transcript, nothing added or removed. Use it when you need a definition or a quotation in the lecturer's exact words. Also available on every plan, guests included.
Special Names: A personal spelling glossary for lecturer names, module terminology and technical vocabulary, so those words are spelled correctly rather than guessed from sound. A spelling reference only. Pro.
Long lectures: Recordings from 20 minutes to 2 hours are processed in the background on Pro, with speaker separation and staged summarisation so the end of a long lecture is covered as well as the start.
Edit & Translate: In Smart Summary mode, get the edited notes in another language in a single pass. It translates the structured output rather than the raw transcript, and remembers the language you chose.
Searchable history: Notes made while signed in are searchable across your devices, and search matches both the transcript and the processed notes. Translated notes carry a badge. Guests get no history.

How to turn a lecture recording into notes

1

Record or upload the lecture

Record in the browser, on iPhone or iPad, or on macOS with the Quick Capture hotkey. Or upload a file you already have: WAV, MP3, M4A, MP4, WebM, OGG or Opus, up to 64 MB.
2

Add your course vocabulary

On Pro, put lecturer names, module terminology and recurring technical words into Special Names, so they are spelled correctly instead of approximated from sound.
3

Choose Smart Summary

Pick Smart Summary rather than Quick Note. Add Edit & Translate if you want the notes in another language. Choose Quick Note only when exact wording matters more than structure.
4

Let it process

Under 20 minutes, the notes come back immediately on any plan. From 20 minutes to 2 hours, processing runs in the background on Pro, so leave it and come back.
5

Search it later

Sign in before you record so the lecture lands in your history. Search matches the transcript and the processed notes, so a half-remembered term finds the right week.

Why a verbatim lecture transcript is hard to revise from

An hour of speech transcribed exactly as spoken is close to unusable for revision. It arrives as one long block of text, with no headings, no paragraph break where the lecturer changed topic, and every restart, aside and half-finished sentence preserved. The information is all there. Finding it again the week before an exam is the problem.

Smart Summary handles the same recording differently. Filler is removed, broken sentences are repaired into readable ones, and the material is organised: headings where the lecture moved on, paragraphs within each part, lists where the lecturer enumerated causes, steps or dates. What it does not do is change the substance. The facts, the figures and the argument stay as delivered. It is an editing pass over your recording, not a rewrite of it.

Quick Note, the verbatim mode, still earns its place. When you need a definition word for word, a quotation you intend to cite, or the exact phrasing of something the lecturer flagged as exam-relevant, verbatim is what you want. Both modes are open on every plan, including without an account, though it is worth choosing the mode deliberately rather than running both by habit.

Where the 20-minute line falls for a lecture recording

Recordings up to 20 minutes are processed immediately, on every plan. From 20 minutes to 2 hours, processing moves to the background and becomes a Pro feature. Two hours is the hard cap per recording, and anything longer is rejected rather than trimmed.

That boundary bites students harder than most people, because a real lecture usually runs 45 to 90 minutes. In practice: a seminar excerpt, a ten-minute problem walkthrough, or a study-group recap fits inside the immediate path on a free account. A full lecture does not.

The arithmetic is easy to check yourself. Usage is measured in minutes of audio, and a 3-minute recording costs 3 minutes in any of the three modes. So a 50-minute lecture costs 50 minutes. Pro includes 360 minutes, six hours, every month, which means seven 50-minute lectures come to 350 minutes and fit with very little to spare. Eight do not.

The free allowance is worth stating plainly rather than burying. Guests get 15 minutes once, in the browser. A free account also gets 15 minutes once, plus searchable history. It is a one-time allowance, not a monthly one: enough to see what Smart Summary does to a piece of a lecture, not enough to carry you through a term.

Names, jargon and notes in a second language

Lecture audio is full of words that have to be guessed from sound: your lecturer's surname, a module code, the name of a theorem, a drug, a case, a compound. Special Names is a personal spelling glossary for exactly that. You add the terms that recur in your course, and they act as a spelling reference so those words come out written correctly instead of approximated. It is a spelling aid only. It never rewrites what was said and never adds words to your notes. Special Names is a Pro feature, held at account level.

If you are studying in a language that is not your first, Edit & Translate is the other piece. It runs in Smart Summary mode and produces the edited notes in a target language in one pass, across roughly 35 languages. It translates the cleaned, structured output rather than the raw transcript, so you get organised notes in your language rather than a translated wall of speech. Your chosen language is remembered, and translated notes carry a badge in your history.

Long recordings get one further piece of handling: speaker separation, plus summarisation in stages, so detail from the last ten minutes of a 90-minute lecture survives as well as detail from the first ten.

Before you press record

Recording a lecture is not automatically permitted. Many institutions expect you to ask the lecturer, some require a formal accommodation, and some allow recording but restrict what you may do with the file or the notes afterwards. Rules differ by country, by university and sometimes by department. Check your course handbook or ask the lecturer directly. This page is not legal advice, and sAInote cannot tell you what applies to your institution.

On the practical side, capture quality matters more than anything that happens afterwards. A phone on the desk with the microphone unobstructed, near the front in a large room, gives a noticeably cleaner result than a device left in a bag. You can record in the browser with no install, in the iPhone and iPad apps, or on macOS, where a global hotkey, Control+Option+Command+N by default, opens Quick Capture without leaving what you were doing. Uploading a file you already recorded works the same way.

Audio goes to private cloud storage: never public, never indexed, never shareable by URL, and cleaned up on a schedule after processing. Signing in is passwordless, using a six-digit emailed code, a magic link, or Sign in with Apple or Google. Accounts can be deleted in the app, which anonymises the data.

Questions about transcribing lectures

Can sAInote turn a one-hour lecture recording into notes?

Yes, on Pro. Recordings up to 20 minutes are processed immediately on every plan, and anything from 20 minutes to 2 hours is a Pro feature processed in the background, so you can close the tab and come back to finished notes. Two hours is the hard cap per recording.

Is sAInote free for students?

No, not entirely. Guests get 15 minutes of audio once, in the browser, with no account, and a free account also gets 15 minutes once plus searchable history. Both are one-time allowances, not monthly ones. Pro gives 360 minutes, six hours, every month, which is where full lectures live.

What is the difference between Quick Note and Smart Summary?

Quick Note returns the transcript verbatim, nothing added or removed. Smart Summary returns the same content edited: filler removed, sentences repaired, headings, paragraphs and lists added, facts unchanged. For revision notes, Smart Summary is the useful one. Quick Note is better when you need exact wording for a quotation or a definition.

Does the AI change what the lecturer actually said?

No. Smart Summary changes form, not content: it strips filler, repairs broken sentences and adds structure, while the facts stay as spoken. If you want the exact wording as well, run the recording through Quick Note as well.

Can I get my lecture notes in a different language from the lecture?

Yes. Edit & Translate works in Smart Summary mode and produces edited notes in roughly 35 target languages in a single pass. It translates the cleaned, structured output rather than the raw transcript, and remembers your choice. Speech recognition itself covers considerably more languages than the 11 interface languages.

Does sAInote transcribe a lecture live, while it is happening?

No. sAInote transcribes a recording. You record the lecture in the browser, in the iPhone or iPad app, or on macOS through Quick Capture, or you upload a file afterwards, and processing starts then. There is no live caption stream and no bot that joins an online class.

What audio formats and file sizes can I upload?

Seven formats: WAV, MP3, M4A, MP4, WebM, OGG and Opus, up to 64 MB per file and a maximum of two hours per recording. Longer recordings are rejected rather than truncated. If a lecture is near the size limit, a compressed format such as M4A or MP3 usually fits where WAV will not.

Am I allowed to record my lectures?

Check before you record. Recording may require the lecturer's or the institution's permission, and policies vary between universities, departments and countries. Some ask for consent in advance, some restrict sharing rather than recording itself. Ask your lecturer or read your institution's policy. This is not legal advice.

Can I find a lecture I recorded weeks ago?

Yes, if you were signed in when you recorded it. Note history is searchable across your devices, and search matches both the transcript and the processed notes, so a half-remembered term from week three will surface the right recording. Translated notes carry a badge. Guests get no history.

Start with one lecture

Take a single recording, run it through Smart Summary and read it next to the verbatim version. Fifteen minutes of audio is enough to see the difference, and that is the free allowance: once, no account required.

Turn a lecture into notes