Processing interviews, voice notes, and conversations recorded during fieldwork is an essential part of qualitative research. These materials are turned into transcripts that later serve as the basis for analysis, interpretation, and academic conclusions.
For KRTK, Alrite provides practical support by turning these audio materials into editable, reviewable, and analysis-ready text quickly.
The research context
The Institute for Regional Studies of the Centre (KRTK) for Economic and Regional Studies operates through several scientific departments and locations in Hungary. Qualitative methodologies play a key role in their research profile, including fieldwork, interviews, participant observation, and related audio-based data collection.
The challenge: manual transcription is time-consuming and costly
One of the most important, yet most time-consuming parts of qualitative research is the verbatim transcription of interviews. Manual transcription can take long hours, especially when a research project generates a large volume of audio material.
However, the challenge was not limited to the time required. Outsourcing transcription is often costly and less flexible: researchers need to adapt to the external provider’s turnaround times, while research work often requires quick access to completed materials. In addition, interviews may contain personal or sensitive information. Making GDPR compliance, transparent data management, and control over data were the key considerations when choosing the right solution.
Why Alrite?
Overall, KRTK needed a solution that could:
- speed up the processing of interviews and voice notes,
- create accurate transcripts in Hungarian,
- remain user-friendly for researchers to use,
- support transcript review and correction,
- make the workflow more flexible compared to outsourced transcription.
Alrite supports the research workflow at multiple points. The researcher uploads an interview, voice note, or other audio material; the application creates an editable transcript, and the text can then be reviewed, corrected, and further processed directly within the Alrite platform.
In practice, this means researchers do not have to start by typing out the entire audio recording manually. Instead, they quickly receive a draft transcript that they can review in a targeted way. The audio segment connected to a specific part of the transcript can be played back easily, making corrections faster and more efficient.
This is particularly useful in qualitative research, where the transcript is not the final goal, but the raw material for analysis. Alrite’s Structured Summary and Aida chatbot features can further support the review and processing of audio materials, helping researchers move faster from technical processing to meaningful academic work: interpretation, coding, comparison, and concluding.
Why Hungarian-language accuracy mattered
For KRTK, one of the most important decision-making criteria was that the speech recognition application should create high-quality transcripts in Hungarian.
In research interviews, it is not enough for the system to roughly recognize what was said. Researchers need text they can actually work with later: to retrieve quotes, check statements, identify patterns, and develop analytical categories.
Based on KRTK’s experience, Alrite provides reliable support in this process.
„ With good-quality audio recordings, the text requires hardly any corrections.”
In addition to accurate Hungarian-language recognition, it was also a positive factor that Alrite offers a professional solution as a Hungarian-developed service. The system can be applied effectively in both domestic and international institutional environments.
Which features support collaboration the most?
Alrite not only speeds up transcription but also supports transcript review and further processing. For KRTK, the user-friendly interface, editable transcripts, faster playback, speaker handling, uncertainty marking, and timestamps have proved especially useful.
This allows researchers to review the text in a more targeted way, find important details faster, and work more transparently with multi-speaker interviews or conversations. Translation, AI features, team collaboration support, and flexible pricing can provide additional value for larger research projects or institutional use.
Data security in research and institutional environments
In a research environment, data security is a key consideration. Interviews may contain personal, sensitive, or research-confidential information, so it matters which system is used to process the audio materials.
When choosing a speech recognition application, accuracy and speed are not the only criteria. Transparent and secure data management is just as important.
For Alrite, GDPR compliance, transparent data management processes, and user control over data are important advantages. These factors help make the application a reliable solution for research institutes, universities, and other institutional environments.
What changed after adopting Alrite?
Based on KRTK’s experience, the processing of interviews has become significantly faster. Researchers can quickly access an editable, usable transcript, which they can review and refine when needed.
With good-quality audio recordings, only minimal corrections are needed. This leads to considerable time savings, especially in projects where multiple interviews or longer audio materials need to be processed.
Using Alrite also makes the workflow more flexible. Researchers are no longer tied to outsourced transcription processes and can work with audio materials and transcripts at their own pace.
For KRTK, one of the most important results is that researchers spend less time on technical and administrative tasks and can focus more on interpreting data, identifying connections, and creating new knowledge.
Additional use cases in research and education
Although KRTK primarily uses Alrite for transcribing interviews and voice notes, the app can also be useful in other research, university, and professional contexts.
At conferences and professional events, live captioning can support accessibility, help maintain attention, and make complex topics easier to follow. It can be especially useful for non-native speakers when they can follow the spoken content in written form. Transcripts of lectures, discussions, and conference materials can also be shared afterwards, making the knowledge presented available to a wider audience.
In educational settings, this can also benefit students: transcripts help them revisit lecture content more easily and focus on understanding during class rather than taking notes.
Work faster with interviews and audio materials
With Alrite’s speech recognition application, interviews, voice notes, lectures, and conference recordings can be quickly turned into editable transcripts. We also offer custom discounts for research institutes, universities, and larger teams.
Request a custom offer and spend more time on analysis instead of manual transcription.