I recently stumbled across an intriguing tool called Vibe, an open-source, cross-platform transcription utility that offers a straightforward solution for converting audio and video files into text. This tool is available on Mac, Windows, and Linux, making it accessible to a broad range of users. You can see it in action in my latest review.
Vibe utilizes the open-source Whisper engine from OpenAI for its transcriptions. The setup process is quite simple, and the software runs directly on your device, which means that none of your data is sent to the cloud.
For my test, I used an interview I had conducted with Tom Persky from FloppyDisk.com, which was about 14 minutes long. I selected the file in Vibe and initiated the transcription process. The application worked through the file rapidly, producing a very accurate transcript.
Vibe offers several output formats, including plain text, HTML, PDF, and SRT files for closed captions. The SRT functionality is particularly useful for those looking to add captions to videos for Plex. However, I noticed that the captions were somewhat bunched together in the initial 30 seconds of the file. After some adjustments, specifically by altering the timestamp settings and sentence length options, I was able to produce a more viewer-friendly SRT file, with captions displayed more evenly across the video.
The tool also supports various transcription models, allowing users to switch between them depending on their needs. The default model worked well for me, but for those requiring different levels of detail or handling more complex audio, alternative models are easily accessible through the settings.
While Vibe is still a work in progress with limited features, it’s a promising start. Its simplicity and effectiveness make it a valuable tool for anyone needing quick and reliable transcriptions. I particularly appreciate that it’s an open-source project, inviting community contributions that could enhance its functionality in the future.