Transcribe Hawaiian audio with WhisperAI
WhisperAI transcribes Hawaiian (ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi) audio for the around 24,000 speakers, with active revitalisation efforts who use the language across Hawaiʻi. Built on OpenAI Whisper and tuned for the realities of Hawaiian speech, the service produces publication-grade transcripts in Latin alphabet with the ʻokina and kahakō (macron) for long vowels.
Hawaiian's tiny phonemic inventory and revitalisation context
Hawaiian has only 13 phonemes — among the smallest inventories of any language — but uses the ʻokina (a glottal stop, written as a reversed apostrophe) and the kahakō (macron) for long vowels. Stripping either changes word meaning. Whisper preserves both diacritics correctly, which matters because Hawaiian is in active revitalisation and getting the orthography right has cultural weight.
Standard ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi is supported with proper ʻokina and kahakō preservation.
What Hawaiian transcripts include
Native Latin alphabet with the ʻokina and kahakō (macron) for long vowels
Output in Latin alphabet with the ʻokina and kahakō (macron) for long vowels with all diacritics, tone marks, special characters and script-specific conventions preserved — never transliteration.
Speaker labels
Diarisation that separates and labels speakers in Hawaiian interviews, panels and multi-party meetings.
Timestamps and SRT
Word-level timestamps and SRT subtitle export for Hawaiian video captioning, with proper line-breaking for the script.
Editor and exports
In-browser editor with PDF, DOCX, TXT and SRT exports. Edit the transcript without leaving the browser, then download the format your downstream workflow expects.
How Hawaiian speakers actually use WhisperAI
- Hawaiian-medium school documentationPūnana Leo and Kula Kaiapuni schools transcribe Hawaiian instructional and administrative meetings.
- Hawaiian cultural preservationCultural and historical organisations transcribe oral histories with kūpuna (elders) preserving the ʻokina and kahakō correctly.
- University of Hawaiʻi researchHawaiian-language departments transcribe Hawaiian-medium lectures and qualitative research.
- Hawaiian-language broadcastingIndependent Hawaiian-language broadcasters transcribe content for distribution and search.
How to transcribe Hawaiian audio
Upload your Hawaiian recording
Drop in MP3, WAV, M4A, MP4 or similar — files up to 5GB. Long-form Hawaiian interviews, lectures and meetings work without splitting.
Whisper transcribes the audio
The model recognises Hawaiian speech across the dialects above and outputs Latin alphabet with the ʻokina and kahakō (macron) for long vowels. Code-switched English and other languages in the same recording are handled inline.
Edit, label and export
Open the transcript in the editor, fix any names or terms, label speakers, and export to PDF, DOCX, TXT or SRT. Optional AI summary surfaces the key points and decisions.
Who actually needs Hawaiian transcription
Hawaiian demand comes from Hawaiʻi-state government and University of Hawaiʻi work supporting language revitalisation, Hawaiian-medium schools, and cultural-preservation organisations.
Dialects and varieties handled
- Standard ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi (Niʻihau dialect is the only continuously-spoken native variety)
Transcription guides and best practices
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Start transcribing Hawaiian today
Sign up free, drop in your first Hawaiian file, and have a usable transcript in minutes.