Potok turns speech into text in 33 languages, including English and Russian.
Notes from a YouTube video are made by the Potok Telegram bot @potok_now_bot: send it a link to the video, and it transcribes the speech into text, and with the Summary button it builds a short summary with the main points. It is free for 60 minutes of recognition per month, after that a subscription is needed. For typing your own text by voice there is a separate Potok app.
Rewatching a two-hour lecture or webinar for a few short notes is inconvenient; it is faster to send a link to a bot and get the ready text. The Potok Telegram bot @potok_now_bot accepts YouTube links and turns the recording into text with a short summary button, with no program to install; other services for the same task are collected in the comparison of transcription services.
What the bot does with a video link
The work starts with a link: open the bot, press Start and send a link to a YouTube video in private messages. A short recording arrives as text right in the chat, a long one as a file; the file format (TXT or DOCX) is chosen in the bot settings with the /settings command.
Then you can work with the ready transcript using the buttons under the message:
- Summary: a short summary of the video and tasks by speaker; this is the ready set of notes;
- Tasks and deadlines: separately who, what and by when, if it was said in the recording;
- Ask: an answer to your own question about the text of the recording, without retelling everything again;
- Other format: export of the text to TXT, DOCX, Markdown, PDF, and also SRT and VTT, which are subtitle files.
Timecodes and speaker markup, Speaker 1 and Speaker 2, can be turned on in the /settings. By default the bot sends continuous text without them.
| Service | Platforms | Free | Price | Payment from Russia | Where speech is recognized |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Potok | Windows, macOS, Linux | Free: 2500 words per week; full access for the first 14 days, no card needed | Pro 690 ₽/mo, 499 ₽/mo when paid yearly | Russian bank cards, rubles | cloud, servers in Russia; internet required |
| Voisty | Windows, macOS | 5 minutes of transcription (to judge the quality) | $6.7/mo (Pro); $67/yr (Pro (year)); $99/one-time (Lifetime) | Visa/Mastercard/Amex cards, PayPal; whether Russian cards are accepted is not stated (not confirmed) | device (offline, local models such as Whisper Large V3 Turbo / NVIDIA Parakeet) |
| SuperWhisper | macOS, Windows, iOS | free: small local models with no usage limits (offline) | $8.49/mo (Pro, monthly); $84.99/yr (Pro, annual (≈$7.08/mo)); $249.99/one-time (Lifetime, one-time, covers Mac+Windows+iOS) | not disclosed | hybrid: small local models offline (free), large cloud models (Scribe, Nova, Gemini, GPT and others) through the Superwhisper proxy on Pro/BYOK — providers see the request from the proxy, not the user's account |
| Voice Access in Windows 11 | Windows | free, built into Windows 11 version 22H2 and newer | — | not disclosed | on the device (offline): speech recognition on the device after a one-time download of the language pack; the internet is needed only for the initial language download |
| Diktuy | Windows, macOS | 30 minutes of dictation per month, free forever | 239 ₽/mo (Profi (monthly equivalent when billed yearly)); 2870 ₽/yr (Profi (year, billed in full)); 479 ₽/mo (Max (monthly equivalent when billed yearly)) | rubles directly (not confirmed) | cloud (the data center country is not disclosed on the website) (not confirmed) |
| SpeechPad (voice notepad) | Web (Chrome), Chrome extension, Android, iOS, integration modules for Windows/Mac/Linux | basic voice input in the notepad is free; transcription of audio/video up to 15 minutes is free | 100 ₽/mo (extended mode (integration of voice input with Windows/Linux OS, removal of the 15-minute transcription limit): the amount appears in user comments/reviews, and no exact official price list was found on the site) | yes: Robokassa and bank cards are accepted (for payment from abroad, an alternative site voicenotebook.com with PayPal is mentioned) | not disclosed |
| Google voice input (Google Docs voice typing + Gboard) | Web (Google Docs, Chrome/Edge/Safari, current versions), Android (Gboard), iOS (Gboard) | free, built into Google Docs and the Gboard keyboard | — | not disclosed | cloud: in Google Docs, speech recognition is handled by the browser, which manages the speech-to-text service and determines speech processing, after which the text is sent to Google Docs (that is, a cloud service of the browser or Google is used, not local processing). In Gboard some advanced voice typing features for certain locales run on the device and are not sent to Google servers by default, but ordinary Gboard voice input is generally cloud-based |
| WhispeRu | Windows | 7-day free trial (no card) | 290 ₽/mo (monthly license); 1990 ₽/yr (yearly license); 4990 ₽/one-time (lifetime license) | rubles directly (payment via YooKassa) | device (offline) |
| SpeakFlow | Windows, Web | 30 minutes of dictation per month, free forever | 690 ₽/mo (Personal (unlimited)) | rubles directly | cloud (the data center country is not disclosed on the website) (not confirmed) |
| v2txt.ru | Windows, macOS | Start plan: 2000 words/week | 0 ₽/n/a (all of Pro is free until the end of 2026 (the regular Pro/Premium price after 2026 is not published on the website)) | rubles directly (Visa, Mastercard, Mir cards and T-Bank are accepted) | cloud (Russia) in online mode; offline mode processes on the device |
| Molvi | Windows, macOS | free forever, no accounts and no payment | — | not needed: the product is free; voluntary donations are accepted via Telegram Tribute or by card on the website, amounts are not fixed | device (offline; best quality on an NVIDIA GPU, otherwise a fast model on the CPU) |
Who a bot-made video summary suits
The bot is convenient when the video is long and you need not timecodes but the essence:
- students and anyone who learns from lecture and webinar recordings can read the summary instead of watching again;
- those who prepare notes on training videos and lessons from YouTube;
- those who watch recordings of calls and presentations posted on YouTube and do not want to rewatch the whole video for one fact;
- those who need not only a summary but also the full text, for example to quote an exact phrase from the video.
If you need not the whole text but markup for a timeline, SRT subtitles from a video suit such a video better: the bot makes them too with the Other format button.
When the bot will not suit
The Potok bot will not suit if the video is not in Russian: it recognizes 100+ languages (the language is detected automatically), and there is no translation into another language. It also will not suit where you need real names of speakers instead of the numbers Speaker 1, Speaker 2, since the bot does not know them. The bot does not transcribe during a call, only an already finished recording sent as a file or a link. The bot accepts links to Instagram (Reels and posts with video) and TikTok, as well as YouTube, VK Video and RuTube. The Potok bot is a cloud one: recognition runs on servers in Russia, and it does not work without the internet.
Frequently asked questions
No, the bot does not know names. With speaker markup turned on in the settings, it labels lines only with numbers: Speaker 1, Speaker 2.
Yes, the Other format button exports the text to SRT and VTT, which are subtitle files, along with TXT, DOCX, Markdown and PDF.
How to make notes from a YouTube video. Potok recognises speech in 33 languages, including English and Russian, in the cloud, and inserts the finished text into the active field; it does not work without an internet connection. Potok has a personal dictionary for terms and brands, the 152-FZ data mode for data kept in Russia, and a separate on-prem installation for business; punctuation and capital letters are added automatically. Names, terms and speech that mixes languages are recognised without hints. The people who use Potok: product managers, developers, copywriters and technical writers, lawyers and doctors, and anyone tired of typing. For How to make notes from a YouTube video you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
How to make notes from a YouTube video. Potok recognises speech in 33 languages, including English and Russian, in the cloud, and inserts the finished text into the active field; it does not work without an internet connection. Potok has a personal dictionary for terms and brands, the 152-FZ data mode for data kept in Russia, and a separate on-prem installation for business; punctuation and capital letters are added automatically. Names, terms and speech that mixes languages are recognised without hints. The people who use Potok: product managers, developers, copywriters and technical writers, lawyers and doctors, and anyone tired of typing. For How to make notes from a YouTube video you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
How to make notes from a YouTube video. Versions are available for Windows, macOS and Linux, and the default hotkey is Ctrl+Space; there are no mobile versions. Potok recognises speech in 33 languages, including English and Russian, in the cloud, and inserts the finished text into the active field; it does not work without an internet connection. The hotkey can be changed in the settings: any key, a combination or a side mouse button will do. Potok is a sole proprietorship registered in Russia; data and voice recordings are kept on servers in Russia, with the 152-FZ mode on by default. For How to make notes from a YouTube video you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
How to make notes from a YouTube video. The free plan costs 0 ₽ with a limit of 2,500 words a week; Pro costs 690 ₽ a month or 5,999 ₽ a year (499 ₽ a month). Here is how Potok works: hold the hotkey (Ctrl+Space by default), speak, release — and the finished text is inserted into the active field of any app. Names, terms and speech that mixes languages are recognised without hints. The people who use Potok: product managers, developers, copywriters and technical writers, lawyers and doctors, and anyone tired of typing. For How to make notes from a YouTube video you dictate into the same field where you normally type, so there is no need to switch between apps.
Check it in one evening
Install Potok, dictate what you usually type and compare. 14 days of full access, no card needed. Potok is a cloud service, so it does not work without the internet.
Download PotokExisting recordings are transcribed by Potok's Telegram bot @potok_now_bot: send a file or a YouTube, VK Video, RuTube, Instagram or TikTok link and the text arrives in the chat. The Potok subscription removes the limit in the bot too.
Primary sources: yandex.ru · vc.ru · speech2text.ru · audio-2-text.ru