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Known Participant
March 17, 2024
Question

Transcription in Premiere is wildly inaccurate

  • March 17, 2024
  • 9 replies
  • 3529 views

I have often said transcription in Adobe premiere is about 75-80% accurate. Now that I have worked with it extensively, it's more like 50%.  It does not distinguish between speakers, the punctuation is more like 20% accurate and it flat out rewrites what someone is saying.  Whisper Transcription is a helluva a lot more accurate (above 90%). And if I want the ultimate in accuracy, I have to pay $2 per minute - which gets really pricey.  Adobe was all proud of the text-based editing feature - and the idea is great in theory - but in practice it's terrible due soully to the failure of the transcription.  Why is a cheap program ($39 for lifetime access) so much better than the software that I pay over $600 a year for? And you can't import the better transcription into Premiere - so you're still doing things the old fashioned way and scrubbing throught he interveiws to find your quotes. I am not affiliated with whomever does Whisper Transcription. Just disappointed - once again - in Adobe.

9 replies

b.scott
Participant
June 12, 2025

Just adding my question here: 
Will Adobe transcription get an upgrade anytime soon? 

I'm using so many other tools where transcription is leaps and bounds beyond what I get out of Adobe Premiere.  Descript, OpusClips, Rev.com.  My current workflow is to output the .acc file to Rev and then use that as my guide.  I create a lot of videos with technical language.  But even when the language is basic it seems that Adobe is way behind.  

R Neil Haugen
Legend
December 9, 2024

Oh, do you mean mixed language, going into/out of English and Portugese? Or perhaps with a number of Portugese words in generally an English discussion?

 

Dialects can be problematic. The wife is Scottish background, my family background is Norwegian. Both have numerous local dialects. Truthfully, a lot of Scots I can't understand.

 

And Norway has still over 400 recognized, official regional dialects in daily use. Min Norke venner have difficulty with transcription services also.

 

It is interesting that an earlier form of their transcription download service works better for you than the newer. 

 

How does their online transcription work, if you're not confined with NDA things on your media?

Everyone's mileage always varies ...
R Neil Haugen
Legend
December 9, 2024

I'm with Stan ...  nearly all of my work, or at least the vast bulk of it ... is talking head interview or explanatory/tutorial stuff. Some with a fair amount of technical lingo involved.

 

There are going to be a few things 'wrong', especially in the tech verbiage. I wish we had a "lexicon" thing we could add, as that would be a big help.

 

But Premiere's transcriptions, for my use, are better than what YouTube or Instagram provide on their own.

 

So perhaps the actual language ... the verbiage used? ... is at issue here. I could easily see some sections of society having more difficulties with auto-transcription than others. Let alone when you get regional dialects thrown in, word use differences and such.

Everyone's mileage always varies ...
Participant
December 9, 2024
I am already complaining with Adobe Premiere Pro for three years and they are deaf. It does not accept my dialect. For 60% the transcript (English and Portuguese) is incorrect. The synchronization is hardly for 10% correct. Does not synchronize with the breaks in the spoken text. So for 30 minutes of video, I need 6 hours to correct.
Also the green screen is unstable with a lot of flikkering.

All updates after version 23.1.0 are worse. Features missing and more and more bugs. However, Adobe is deaf, continue to add more features, in stead of solving the bugs.

Wilfred
Stan Jones
Community Expert
Community Expert
December 9, 2024

@williammoline,

 

Thanks for reporting.

 

> If you are looking for specific examples, try it yourself on almost any video... IT IS REALLY BAD

 

Well, that's the thing. I've tested many samples over a number of PR versions and have never gotten the kind of extreme examples you and some others report. Can you upload a short sample clip and exported transcript? (E.g. dropbox) I'll test.

 

What is your current version of PR?

 

Stan

 

Participant
December 9, 2024

Been an issue for years. Currently, running a 3070 gaming rig and transcribing english - the transcriptions provided by premiere pro are wildly inaccurate. Social platform's native transcription (FB / IG / TikTok) has been far superior for atleast 6 years. Thought it would get better in the past year... but it hasn't. If you are looking for specific examples, try it yourself on almost any video... IT IS REALLY BAD - worthy of canceling my subscription over.

Kevin-Monahan
Community Manager
Community Manager
August 20, 2024

Hello @UNHAPPY_ADOBE_USER10969523 and @doubleclutched,

I'm Kevin from support, and I'm a mod here. I hope you are well today. I'm grateful for your bug report and the feedback you gave. Are you still having the problem, or has it gotten better? If you are still having trouble, the team needs more info about your system and media to reproduce your bug. See, How do I write a bug report?

 

I hope the team will respond shortly. I apologize for the bug.

 

Take Care,
Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community and Engagement Strategist – Adobe Pro Video and Audio
Participant
August 13, 2024

The new transcribe engine is was unauthorized installed on my computer (Version 23.0.0) is complete rubbish for English and Portuguese. During a chat of 3 hours, and various attemps including installing version 24 and Beta, it remained absolute RUBBISH and only 0,03% was correct.

Luckily on my son's computer there was still the old version 23.0.0 transcribe engine which transcribes for 70% correct in English and Portuguese. 
I wish to have the old transcribe version 23.0.0 back on my computer. On newer versions introduce more and more bugs.

Kevin-Monahan
Community Manager
Community Manager
August 13, 2024

Hi @wilfredrene,

Thanks for writing up your bug report. I'm Kevin from support, a mod here.

 

Sorry to hear about your transcription problem. You might try the solution here to see if it helps. Let the community know if it does or not. If not, please offer the team more information about your system, media, and workflow. See, How do I write a bug report?

 

I hope the team can help you with this bug soon. I am sorry for such a frustrating experience.

 

Thanks,

Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community and Engagement Strategist – Adobe Pro Video and Audio
R Neil Haugen
Legend
March 18, 2024

Where are you from? what language are you working with? What trade or technical terms are included? 

 

Transcription services are heavily influenced by those things, so a genreral comment of "it ain't accurate" unfortunately ain't of much use to fix anything.

Everyone's mileage always varies ...
Participating Frequently
March 18, 2024

Used the filler word removal feature today and it's not nearly as clean as the other software we were using. Doesn't show what the filler word is in the transcript. Ignoring filler feature is buggy. And counts words outside of "um" and "uh" as filler.

 

Likely going back to using it versus using Premiere Pro.