Buzz: Popular open-source desktop app that transcribes and translates audio offline on your own computer using OpenAI's Whisper. Looppanel: AI research assistant that records, transcribes and auto-notes user interviews and calls, then organizes insights in a research repository. Which one wins depends on your platform mix, budget, and how hands-off you want notes to be.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist Buzz when transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline matters most, and Looppanel when running thematic and sentiment analysis across research calls matters most. Run both through a week of actual calls to see which suits your workflow.
Popular open-source desktop app that transcribes and translates audio offline on your own computer using OpenAI's Whisper.
AI research assistant that records, transcribes and auto-notes user interviews and calls, then organizes insights in a research repository.
Buzz is a widely used open-source desktop application that transcribes and translates audio offline on the user's personal computer, powered by OpenAI's Whisper. It is MIT-licensed and actively maintained, with v1.4.4 released in March 2026, and it has grown a large community with roughly 19.7k GitHub stars. Buzz runs on macOS, Windows, and Linux, with installation options including Flatpak, Snap, and PyPI. It supports both importing existing audio and video files and real-time transcription from microphone input, and it can export results in formats such as TXT, SRT, and VTT for subtitling and documentation. The app includes an advanced transcript viewer with search and playback controls, a watch folder for automatically transcribing new files, and a command-line interface for automation. It offers GPU acceleration through CUDA for Nvidia cards, Apple Silicon support, and Vulkan for many other GPUs, which makes faster transcription practical even on laptops. Buzz also provides speaker identification and speech separation for noisy audio, plus a plugin system that adds capabilities like AI-generated summaries. Because all processing happens locally, recordings and transcripts remain on the user's machine rather than being uploaded to a cloud service. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Looppanel is an AI research and meeting assistant built for user interviews, usability tests and research calls. Its AI note-taker records or ingests interview recordings, transcribes the conversation, and automatically generates structured notes, quotes and summaries so researchers do not have to take notes manually during a session. The platform supports transcription in several languages and keeps recordings private without human access. Beyond transcription and notes, Looppanel adds an analysis layer: it performs AI thematic analysis to surface patterns across conversations, supports AI-assisted tagging tied to a discussion guide or emerging themes, runs sentiment analysis, and highlights important moments. Researchers can trace every insight back to the source recording, edit tags, search across projects, and share actionable video clips, with all findings collected in a central research repository for stakeholders. It also works with other data types such as survey responses and documents. Looppanel is aimed at UX researchers, product managers and design teams who run many interviews and need to turn recorded qualitative conversations into transcripts, notes and shareable insights faster than analyzing them by hand. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); Looppanel is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | Buzz | Looppanel |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Offline transcription and translation using OpenAI's Whisper | AI note-taker that records and auto-generates notes from interviews and calls |
| Standout feature | Real-time transcription from microphone input | Transcription with support for multiple languages |
| Team usage | Speaker identification and speech separation for noisy audio | AI thematic analysis to surface patterns across conversations |
| Integrations | Exports to TXT, SRT, and VTT | AI-assisted tagging based on discussion guides and emerging themes |
| Languages & capture | Watch folder for automatic transcription and a command-line interface | Sentiment analysis and automatic highlighting of key moments |
| Best-fit workflow | GPU acceleration via CUDA, Apple Silicon, and Vulkan | Shareable video clips and traceable links back to source recordings |
Buzz
Choose Buzz if you need transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline — strengths include fully offline so audio and transcripts stay on the user's computer.
Looppanel
Choose Looppanel if you need transcribing and auto-noting user interviews and usability tests — strengths include purpose-built for interview transcription plus downstream qualitative analysis.
Buzz
Looppanel
It depends on your workflow. Buzz is strong for transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline, while Looppanel is strong for transcribing and auto-noting user interviews and usability tests. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades and Looppanel is a free tier with paid upgrades. Check each vendor's pricing page for the latest plans and free-tier limits.
Sure. Running both makes sense when their strengths don't overlap and the budget allows.
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