What Filipino transcriptionists charge
The pricing models clients actually use, what moves your rate up, and how to work out whether a job is worth taking.
Free: 60 min per 30 days, files up to 30 min / 50 MB · Paid plans: 10 to 100 hrs, files up to 2 GB. Big video? Upload just its audio track: same transcript, much faster upload.
Encrypted in transit · audio & video auto-delete in 30 days · never used to train AI
Optional settings
Set this for the most accurate result on quiet or mixed audio.
Get a second copy translated into another language (Pro).
Uncommon words the AI might misspell. List them so they come out right.
Last updated 25 July 2026
There is no single going rate for transcription work from the Philippines, and anyone quoting one number is guessing. What exists instead are pricing models, and understanding them is the difference between a job that pays well and one that quietly costs you money. The three you will meet are per audio minute, per working hour, and per project, and they are not interchangeable.
Per audio minute is the industry standard and the one to learn first, because it is the only model that prices the thing that actually varies: how long the recording is. A clean one-hour interview and a muddy one-hour focus group take completely different amounts of work, which is why experienced transcriptionists quote a base rate and adjust it for difficulty rather than quoting flat. Per working hour suits ongoing client relationships where the work is mixed. Per project suits well-defined deliverables where you can estimate confidently.
The arithmetic that decides everything is your real throughput. Manual transcription traditionally took four to six hours of work per hour of audio, which put a hard ceiling on daily earnings. Working from an AI draft and doing the review pass instead compresses that dramatically, so the same rate per audio minute produces substantially more per working day. Before accepting any job, estimate your hours realistically, divide the offered fee by them, and compare the result against what your time is worth. That single calculation filters out most bad work.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Should I charge per audio minute or per hour?
Per audio minute for one-off files, because it prices the variable that matters and protects you when audio is longer than promised. Per working hour for ongoing clients with mixed tasks. Avoid per-project pricing until you can estimate your own speed reliably, since underestimating a difficult file is the most common way freelancers lose money.
What justifies a higher rate?
Specialization and risk. Legal, medical and research transcription pay more because errors carry consequences and the vocabulary is demanding. Fast turnaround, multiple speakers with attribution, verbatim transcription including filler words, and heavily accented or noisy audio all justify premiums. Filipino and Taglish audio is a specialization many providers cannot offer at all.
Should I charge less because I use AI?
No. Clients buy a verified, correctly formatted transcript they can rely on, not your keystrokes. The AI produces a draft; you supply the judgment, the corrections and the accountability. Discounting because a tool helps you work faster gives away the entire benefit of working efficiently.
How do I handle difficult audio in my pricing?
Ask for a sample before quoting, always. Listen to two minutes and check for crosstalk, background noise and heavy accents. If the audio is hard, quote your difficult-audio rate or decline. Quoting blind on a file you have not heard is how a profitable job turns into an unpaid afternoon.
What do the tools cost against what I earn?
Software should be a small fraction of what the work pays. The free plan (60 minutes every 30 days, no card) covers trial jobs and occasional files. Basic at $12 a month covers 10 hours of audio, which for most freelancers is a fraction of a single client project. Price your work so tools are a rounding error, not a concern.
Who uses this?
- Freelance transcriptionists setting their rates
- Virtual assistants quoting transcription to clients
- Agencies subcontracting Philippine talent
- Anyone deciding whether a transcription job is worth taking
Worth knowing: Rates in this market vary enormously by client, country and specialization, and published figures go stale quickly, so we deliberately give you the models rather than a number to copy. The reliable approach is to work out your own cost per working hour, estimate your real throughput on a sample, and quote from that. A rate that works for someone else's client mix may be wrong for yours in both directions.
Related pages
Where the work comes from
Transcription CostWhat clients pay, from their side
For Virtual AssistantsDelivering client work faster
Explore everything in Answers or browse all transcription tools.