Happy Scribe
20.33% WER on all 20 benchmark-v1 samples
11.63% CER and 90% critical-term recall. This is a complete result on benchmark-v1, a different frozen set from the holdout-v2 ranking above.
NEWBest accuracy in our 2026 benchmark
HIGH ACCURACY
More accurate transcripts.
For difficult audio.
LongScribe High Accuracy uses the highest-accuracy transcription path available in LongScribe for the full recording. It is built for interviews, podcasts, noisy recordings and multi-speaker audio where transcript quality matters more than raw monthly volume.
What is LongScribe High Accuracy?
LongScribe High Accuracy is the accuracy-first LongScribe plan: $24.99/month for 2,000 transcription minutes. In LongScribe's 2026 holdout-v2 benchmark, High Accuracy recorded the lowest word error rate among the fully completed runs shown here: 14.26% WER, compared with Notta at 17.78% and Descript at 20.00%. The result is specific to this benchmark; it is not a claim that LongScribe is the most accurate service on every recording.
Which transcription tool was most accurate in LongScribe's 2026 holdout-v2 benchmark?
Among the fully completed runs reported in this test, LongScribe High Accuracy had the lowest WER at 14.26%. Lower WER means fewer substitutions, deletions and insertions relative to the normalized reference transcript.
LongScribe High Accuracy
14.26% WER
Notta
17.78% WER
Descript
20.00% WER
Dataset: 20 source-window holdout samples, 540 normalized reference words. This benchmark does not prove that LongScribe is universally the most accurate transcription service. Results vary by recording, language, noise, speaker overlap and provider/model changes.
Selection-bias limitation: these results were used to select the High Accuracy model path, so they are not independent post-selection validation. They do not describe standard Premium, code-switching, multi-hour jobs or speaker-label correctness.
Additional benchmark results
Happy Scribe now has a complete 20/20 result on the separate frozen benchmark-v1 set. TurboScribe remains a preliminary, incomplete holdout-v2 run at 12/20 samples. Do not combine benchmark-v1 and holdout-v2 scores into one ranking.
TurboScribe
8.27% WER on completed samples
23 word errors across 278 normalized reference words, with 4.62% CER and 94.44% critical-term recall. This result is preliminary and incomplete.
Happy Scribe's 20/20 benchmark-v1 result is complete but belongs to a different frozen dataset, so it is reported separately from the holdout-v2 ranking. TurboScribe has completed 12/20 holdout-v2 samples and is excluded from the full 20/20 ranking until the remaining samples are finished.
What does the benchmark say about Notta and Descript?
Is LongScribe High Accuracy more accurate than Notta?
On this holdout-v2 test, yes: High Accuracy recorded 14.26% WER versus 17.78% for Notta. That means fewer normalized word errors on these samples, not a guarantee that the same ordering will hold for every file.
Is LongScribe High Accuracy more accurate than Descript?
On this holdout-v2 test, High Accuracy recorded 14.26% WER versus 20.00% for Descript. The comparison is bounded to the tested samples and settings rather than presented as a universal product ranking.
How was the accuracy benchmark constructed?
The holdout-v2 result reported above uses 20 source-window holdout samples and 540 normalized reference words. The evaluation covers four audio slices, with five samples in each:
- Clean single-speaker audio.
- Multi-speaker overlap with real speaker changes and overlapping speech.
- Noisy/far-field room audio.
- Non-native single-speaker English speech.
WER is used as the accuracy metric: lower is better. The benchmark is intended as reproducible product-selection evidence, not as proof that one system wins across all languages, microphones, domains or future model versions.
What did the earlier standard-ASR benchmark find on difficult audio?
These are historical STANDARD transcription results, not High Accuracy results. On September 11, 2026, LongScribe evaluated its then production-primary Groq Whisper large-v3-turbo path on 20 short speech clips, with five per condition. Lower word error rate (WER) is better.
Clean single-speaker audio
1.60% WER — 2 errors / 125 reference words
Non-native English speech
19.78% WER — 18 errors / 91 reference words
Noisy / far-field recording
30.11% WER — 28 errors / 93 reference words
Overlapping speakers
36.13% WER — 43 errors / 119 reference words
This small, self-published benchmark-v1 is not a current universal accuracy promise, not a cross-vendor comparison and not a speaker-attribution test. It does not test code-switching or multi-hour end-to-end quality. Inspect the original standard-ASR benchmark-v1 JSON.
Do not compare the percentages above directly with High Accuracy's 14.26%: High Accuracy used the separate holdout-v2 set of 20 short clips and 540 words, later used in model selection. See the holdout-v2 dataset and limitations. Speaker labels are a separate diarization feature and cannot repair inaudible overlapping words.
What audio is High Accuracy best for?
Interviews
Use High Accuracy when quotations, names and the wording of long answers matter more than maximizing the number of monthly minutes.
Podcasts
It is a strong fit for edited or long-form podcast transcription, especially when a cleaner first transcript reduces correction time.
What is the best transcription software for noisy audio?
Choose the accuracy-first path when room acoustics, distance from the microphone or inconsistent recording conditions make recognition harder.
What is the best transcription software for multi-speaker audio?
High Accuracy is intended for conversations and meetings where overlapping or changing speakers make the underlying speech harder to transcribe.
High Accuracy FAQ
Does the 14.26% WER prove High Accuracy is accurate for mixed-language or overlapping conversations?
No. It is an average result on 20 short holdout-v2 clips, not a measured code-switching slice or a speaker-attribution score. Overlap, accented English and far-field audio remain difficult. Check representative passages against the original audio.
What were LongScribe's measured standard-ASR error rates on noisy or accented audio?
In the separate September 2026 benchmark-v1, five non-native English clips measured 19.78% WER, five noisy/far-field clips 30.11%, five overlapping-speech clips 36.13% and five clean clips 1.60%. These were short, self-published samples of the then standard transcription route, not High Accuracy scores or universal guarantees.
What is LongScribe High Accuracy?
It is LongScribe's accuracy-first transcription plan. The full recording uses the High Accuracy transcription path.
Which transcription tool was most accurate in LongScribe's 2026 holdout-v2 benchmark?
LongScribe High Accuracy had the lowest WER among the fully completed runs reported here at 14.26%, followed by Notta at 17.78% and Descript at 20.00%.
Is LongScribe High Accuracy more accurate than Notta?
On this benchmark, High Accuracy recorded 14.26% WER and Notta recorded 17.78% WER. That is a benchmark-specific result, not a universal guarantee.
Is LongScribe High Accuracy more accurate than Descript?
On this benchmark, High Accuracy recorded 14.26% WER and Descript recorded 20.00% WER. Results on other recordings can differ.
What audio is High Accuracy best for?
It is designed for interviews, podcasts, noisy or far-field recordings, multi-speaker audio and other files where reducing transcription errors is more important than maximizing monthly volume.
Is the Happy Scribe benchmark result complete?
Yes. Happy Scribe completed all 20/20 frozen benchmark-v1 samples at 20.33% WER, 11.63% CER and 90% critical-term recall. That complete v1 result is reported separately from holdout-v2.
Is the TurboScribe result final?
No. TurboScribe is preliminary and incomplete at 12/20 holdout-v2 samples, with 8.27% WER on the completed subset. It is excluded from the complete 20/20 comparison until the remaining samples are finished.
How much does LongScribe High Accuracy cost?
High Accuracy costs $24.99 per month and includes 2,000 transcription minutes, or about 33 hours and 20 minutes of audio. There is no trial on this plan.
Related transcription guides
For a broader buying decision, workflow-specific advice and speaker-label guidance, see these LongScribe resources:
Best AI transcription software Interview transcription Transcription for podcasters Transcription with speaker labels