How to use an iPhone to record interviews and how to get the recording transcribed

This is our guide on using an iPhone to do a recording and how to send it to get the recording transcribed. These guidelines are relevant for iPhones from start to finish. All they need to have is a functioning “Voice Memos” app which is found quite often in the Utilities sub folder.

Voice Memos App Button

1. Select the “Voice Memos” app and you get the following screen:

Voice Memo Record Function2. To record the interview or focus group etc., simply place the iPhone between the speakers – preferably equidistant from any that you want to pick up, remembering that your microphone is the part of the iPhone you speak into (easy mistake to make!).

3. Press the big red button to start recording.

4. Press the big red button to stop recording.

5. Click “Done” on the right hand side. Your iPhone will have created an .m4a audio file for you, all ready to send to us!

6. You can trim the recording down by pressing the ‘trim’ button if you don’t want all of the recording transcribed. Just press the trim button that appears on the right hand side (looks like a blue rectangle with ends sticking out).

7. If you click the recording that appears in the list below after you click “Done”, you will see an option to Forward, Edit or Delete. The button we are concerned with is the “Forward” button, although Apple don’t like the word ‘forward’ for some reason. The button is highlighted in the screenshot below.

Button for Emailing Recording

8. Click the button and you get a list of options to send the file. If the file is less than about 10MB, you will get the option to email. Gmail and Yahoo email go slightly higher to about 25MB. Simply click the “mail” button, enter our email address – anna@universitytranscriptions.co.uk – and click send.

9. That’s it! Job done. No need for any file transfers etc..

10. If the file is larger than 10mb or thereabouts, then chances are you won’t be given the option to send by email. Instead you will need to do the following:

11. Save the file to your iPhone. Anywhere is fine. You do this by clicking the option at the bottom of the page “Save to File”. Choose a location and click save.

12. Visit https://www.universitytranscriptions.co.uk/upload-files/ and fill out the short form. Click to select your file from your iPhone. Attach it to the form and click “Upload”.

13. Wait for an acknowledgement by email.

Here is a list of the iPhone versions we think this guidance is for:

1 iPhone
2 iPhone 3G
3 iPhone 3GS
4 iPhone 4
5 iPhone 4S
6 iPhone 5
7 iPhone 5c
8 iPhone 5s
9 iPhone 6
10 iPhone 6 Plus
11 iPhone 6s
12 iPhone 6s Plus
13 iPhone SE
14 iPhone 7
15 iPhone 7 Plus
16 iPhone 8
17 iPhone 8 Plus
18 iPhone X
19 iPhone XR
20 iPhone XS
21 iPhone XS Max