Export a transcript to PDF, Word, SRT and four other formats

A transcript is only useful once it is where you need it: a document for a client, subtitles for a video, a note in Apple Notes, a folder your other tools watch. You can export a transcript to PDF, Word, SRT, VTT, JSON, Markdown or plain text, share it through the standard system sheet, or have every new transcript saved to a folder automatically. Here is each route.

Which format for which job

Every export menu offers the same seven, and the right one depends on where the file goes next.

• Plain Text: the transcript as text, with or without timestamps and speaker names depending on your view settings. Use it when something else will read the file, or when you want the most durable copy.
• Markdown: plain text with structure that survives, so headings, speaker names and timestamps arrive as Markdown. Use it for Obsidian, Notion or a wiki, anywhere you will search the transcript later.
• PDF: the final version. It fixes the layout, so what you send is what the other person sees, which is why it is a poor intermediate step. Use it for a client or an archive copy, never for a document someone must edit.
• Word Document: a .docx for when the other person will work on the text, with track changes and comments at the far end. Use it for anything that goes through review.
• JSON: for software, not for people. Every segment with start and end times, speaker and text, so a script can filter by speaker or cut clips at segment boundaries.
• SRT Subtitles: numbered, timed cues that almost every player and video editor accepts. Use it for a video edit, or for a platform that asks for a caption file without saying which.
• VTT Subtitles: the web standard for captions, and what an HTML <track> element expects. Use it for video on your own site.

Export from a transcript on Mac

1. Open the transcript.
2. Click Export in the toolbar and choose a format. The label flips to Exported! once the file is saved.
3. Export Audio… in the same menu saves the recording itself.

The Copy all text button next to it puts the transcript on the clipboard, and Edit > Copy Full Transcript (Command-Shift-C) does the same from the keyboard. Share transcript opens the macOS share sheet for Mail, Messages, AirDrop and any app that accepts text.

Export from a transcript on iPhone

1. Open the transcript and tap the ⋯ button.
2. Under Export, tap Export as followed by the format you want. The file goes to the share sheet, so you can save it to Files, AirDrop it, or hand it to another app.
3. Share Audio sends the recording; Share Text sends the plain transcript; Copy Text and Copy Cleaned Text put it on the clipboard.

What survives the trip into another app

An export is a copy, and every copy loses something. The losses are predictable.

In a word processor, a .docx arrives with its paragraphs, bold text and headings intact and keeps working as a document: styles apply, tracked changes work, the word count is real. What does not arrive is any notion that a timestamp is a timestamp or a speaker label is a speaker. Both are ordinary text a find-and-replace can mangle. A PDF is the opposite: the layout is perfect and the structure is gone, so text pulled back out of it arrives with broken line endings and stray hyphens.

In a note-taking app, Markdown behaves best. Apps that store Markdown natively keep the file as written; apps that convert on import turn the headings into their own rich text, which looks right but leaves no markup to edit.

What never travels is an edit made after the export. Correcting a name in the .docx does not correct it in the transcript, so decide where the authoritative copy lives before you edit in two places.

How timestamps and speaker labels are represented

Only some formats have anywhere to put this, which is the real reason there are seven.

Documents (Text, Markdown, PDF, Word) carry both as text, in the order they appear on screen: a time, a name, then the words. Nothing marks them as special, so a later tool cannot strip them automatically. JSON is the only format that keeps them as separate fields, which is what lets a script rebuild the transcript however it likes.

SRT keeps time and drops everything else. Each cue is a number, a start and end time separated by an arrow, the text, and a blank line, with a comma before the milliseconds:

1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,400
Alex: Thanks everyone for making the time today.

2
00:00:03,900 --> 00:00:08,250
Priya: Let's start with last quarter's numbers.

SRT has no speaker field, so a name can only sit inside the cue text, conventionally as a prefix like the one above. VTT is the same idea with a WEBVTT header and full stops before the milliseconds, and it does have a speaker construct, the voice span, which browsers can style:

WEBVTT

1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.400
<v Alex>Thanks everyone for making the time today.

2
00:00:03.900 --> 00:00:08.250
<v Priya>Let's start with last quarter's numbers.

Both expect cues in chronological order with no overlapping times, and both are plain text, so a wrong word or a late caption can be fixed in any editor before you hand the file over.

Send a summary to Apple Notes

In the AI Assistant, the Export section under the results has a Notes button that creates a note in Apple Notes with the summary, or the cleaned transcript, depending on which result you have selected. Word, PDF and TXT are next to it for the AI output. This is the fastest way to get minutes into the note you already keep for a project.

Auto-export every transcript to a folder (Mac)

If you want every new transcript to land in a folder, for a Finder workflow, a Hazel rule, an Obsidian vault or a shared drive:

1. Open Settings > Transcription.
2. Under Auto-Export, turn on Auto-Export After Transcription.
3. Pick the Format.
4. Click Choose… next to Export Folder and select the folder.

From then on each finished transcript, whether recorded or imported, is written there in that format. Point it at a folder inside your Obsidian vault with Markdown selected and every meeting becomes a note automatically.

Export a collection

On Mac, right-click a collection in the sidebar to export all of its transcripts at once. This is how to hand over a whole project's interviews, or to archive a semester of lectures. Markdown export is also the quickest way into podcast show notes and chapters, because the timestamps come across with the text.

Back up or move the whole library

Backup & Restore (Settings > About on Mac, Settings on iPhone) has Export Library…, which writes transcripts and audio to a single archive, and Import Library… to restore it, on the same device or a new one. Use it before wiping a machine, or to move a library between devices without iCloud. Keeping two devices in step is a different job from this one, and the guide to sync and backup sets out what travels between devices and what does not. The backup keeps a record of deletions, so restoring an old archive does not resurrect transcripts you removed on purpose.

Frequently asked questions

Can I export with speaker names and timestamps?

Yes. Plain Text, Markdown, PDF and Word Document follow the transcript's display: with speaker names when speakers are identified, and with timestamps when they are shown. JSON always includes both.

Does export send anything to a server?

No. Files are written directly by the app on your device. Sharing goes through the system share sheet to the app you pick, and only there.

Can I export to Notion or Obsidian?

Obsidian: use Markdown export, or point Auto-Export at a folder in your vault. Notion: export Markdown and import it, or paste from Copy all text. There is no direct Notion connector; everything stays local unless you send it somewhere.

Where do exported files go by default?

On Mac you choose the location each time you export, and Auto-Export writes to the folder you selected. On iPhone the share sheet lets you save to Files or send to another app.