Buzz: Popular open-source desktop app that transcribes and translates audio offline on your own computer using OpenAI's Whisper. Outset: AI-moderated research platform that runs multimodal interviews at scale and auto-synthesizes themes, quotes, and highlight reels. The right pick comes down to team size, budget, and the workflows you want to automate.
How Hosiqo compares and tests toolsFinal recommendation
Shortlist Buzz when transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline matters most, and Outset when continuous customer discovery with rapid automated synthesis 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-moderated research platform that runs multimodal interviews at scale and auto-synthesizes themes, quotes, and highlight reels.
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
Outset is an all-in-one AI-moderated research platform that combines conversational AI with behavioral and emotional analysis to run qualitative interviews at scale. Its AI moderator conducts natural, adaptive conversations via video, voice, or text, dynamically probing based on audio and visual cues to uncover detail beyond surface-level answers, and supports interviews in effectively any language across a broad set of countries. Researchers set up interview guides quickly with help from automated logic, including advanced probing rules and intelligent question skipping, and the platform can field hundreds of interviews simultaneously. Built-in recruitment provides access to a very large pool of potential participants across many geographies, or teams can bring their own audience. After interviews complete, Outset automatically synthesizes results into relevant summaries, themes, powerful quotes, and customizable highlight reels without manual tagging, and generates shareable outputs including custom AI-generated reports, highlight reels, and slide decks for stakeholders. Most teams complete interviews within hours and receive AI-synthesized summaries minutes later. The company is venture-backed and reports adoption by large enterprises using the platform to accelerate or replace traditional market research methods. Pricing varies by plan. Check the official website for current pricing.
Best suited for
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium); Outset is a free tier with paid upgrades (freemium). Always confirm current pricing on each vendor's site before buying.
| Feature | Buzz | Outset |
|---|---|---|
| Core capability | Offline transcription and translation using OpenAI's Whisper | AI moderator conducting multimodal video, voice, and text interviews |
| Standout feature | Real-time transcription from microphone input | Dynamic probing driven by audio and visual cues |
| Team usage | Speaker identification and speech separation for noisy audio | Automated interview-guide setup with probing rules and smart skipping |
| Integrations | Exports to TXT, SRT, and VTT | Hundreds of simultaneous interviews with built-in recruitment |
| Languages & capture | Watch folder for automatic transcription and a command-line interface | Automatic synthesis into summaries, themes, quotes, and highlight reels |
| Best-fit workflow | GPU acceleration via CUDA, Apple Silicon, and Vulkan | Stakeholder outputs including custom reports and slide decks |
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.
Outset
Choose Outset if you need running large-scale qualitative interviews for market research — strengths include runs large volumes of interviews in parallel with fast synthesis.
Buzz
Outset
It depends on your workflow. Buzz is strong for transcribing recorded meetings, interviews, podcasts, or lectures offline, while Outset is strong for running large-scale qualitative interviews for market research. Both transcribe and summarize meetings.
Buzz is a free tier with paid upgrades and Outset is a free tier with paid upgrades. Check each vendor's pricing page for the latest plans and free-tier limits.
Often yes: teams combine tools when one handles capture and another handles analysis.
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