Transcribe Japanese audio to text
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Japanese transcription, in detail
Accuracy, the accents we cover, and the words worth teaching your custom dictionary.
Estimated accuracy
Known locally as
Script, left to right
Model
Estimated on clear, single-speaker audio. Recording quality, crosstalk and background noise move this figure further than the language itself does.
Accents and varieties covered
Japanese is not one accent. These are the varieties the model is built to handle, so a regional speaker is not a special case.
Standard Japanese Tokyo Kansai Business keigo- Speakers
- about 123 million
- Where it's spoken
- Japan, with communities in Brazil and the United States
- Language family
- Japonic
- Say hello
- こんにちは
What the output looks like
Timestamped, speaker-labelled, and editable in your browser the moment it lands.
まず前四半期の数字から見ていきましょう。
In English: Let's start by looking at last quarter's figures.
Words worth adding to your custom dictionary
Every language has a handful of words any engine has to guess at. In Japanese these are the usual ones. Add them to your custom dictionary once and they come back right in every transcript from then on.
| Commonly guessed | What you meant | Why they collide |
|---|---|---|
| 機構 | 気候 | Homophones are extremely common and only the kanji distinguishes them. |
| 田中産 | 田中さん | The honorific san and the suffix meaning produced in are homophones. |
| コンサルティング | コンサルタント | Long katakana loanwords truncate mid-word. |
Getting the best Japanese transcript
Add company names, product names and industry terms to your custom dictionary. Japanese has many homophones, and the dictionary is what tells the model which characters your sector uses.
Ask each participant to state their name and company at the start. Japanese surnames share many readings, and a spoken introduction lets you attach the right kanji to each speaker label in the editor.
Common questions about Japanese transcription
Who needs Japanese transcription?
Japanese broadcasters and publishers, manufacturing and automotive companies documenting technical reviews, legal and financial services, and international firms recording meetings with Japanese partners.
How accurate is Japanese transcription?
We estimate around 96.7% on clear, single-speaker Japanese audio. Recording quality moves that figure further than the language does, so a close microphone and one person speaking at a time is the biggest lever you have. Names, places and industry terms go into your custom dictionary once and come back right in every transcript after that.
Which Japanese accents and dialects are supported?
These varieties: Standard Japanese, Tokyo, Kansai, Business keigo. The model is built for all of them, so a recording with several accents in the room is handled the same way as one without.
What is distinctive about Japanese?
Japanese has a very large number of homophones, and which word was meant is carried by the written characters rather than the sound. The model chooses the kanji from context, and handles the layered politeness levels that business Japanese runs on.
Will Japanese text export correctly?
Yes. Japanese text (Kanji, hiragana and katakana) comes through every export unchanged: Microsoft Word, PDF, plain text, and SRT, VTT and Avid DS subtitles. Text direction and diacritics survive the round trip, so a transcript opens the way it looked in the editor.
How long does Japanese transcription take?
Most transcriptions are ready in less time than the length of the file. A 60-minute recording is typically processed well under an hour, and you get an email as soon as it is ready.
Can I translate a Japanese transcript?
Yes. Pick a target language and click translate: your Japanese transcript is translated into any of 60+ languages as a full, editable document with word-level timestamps preserved, so you can export subtitles from the translation just as you would from the original.
Why transcribe Japanese with Go Transcribe
Sign up with Go Transcribe today and work with one of the most sophisticated transcription software in the market.
Collaboration Tools
If you work with colleagues on the same files, Go Transcribe is built for it. Annotate, highlight and add comments, and share your findings with your team.
Advanced Artificial Intelligence
Advanced AI speech recognition that handles a wide range of accents, dialects and languages.
Trusted by Businesses Globally
Thousands of businesses work with Go Transcribe and rely on us for Japanese transcription.
One-Click Translation
Translate your Japanese transcripts to over 60 languages with a single click. Create multilingual versions of the same recording without leaving the editor.
Ensuring accuracy for automatically transcribing Japanese audio into text
Just like converting any language audio or video file into text, there are a few tips to follow to get the best results:
Ensure that speakers are not talking over each other and that the recording device is close to the person speaking.
Try to reduce background noise
Try to eliminate any static or echo
Our customers are our biggest fans.
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User friendly, efficient and gets the job done! A very useful tool for all those who are not natural note takers!
This has got to be the fastest, easiest and cheapest way to create transcriptions. This makes writing meeting minutes so much easier. A big fan!
We've transcribed six hour-long interviews and go-transcribe works a treat. not 100% by any means, but good enough to save us days of manual transcription.
I used Go Transcribe to make the initial transcription and it was much easier. I'll certainly recommend it and use it again.
This service saves me a ton of time, and for the price the accuracy is really good. I sent a message to the support team and they replied really quickly.
Other Supported Languages
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