# HarkNote — Private on-device transcriber

> Private on-device transcriber (iPhone/iPad app by Christopher Knuteson.)

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/harknote/id6770582770 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`)
- Developer: [Christopher Knuteson](https://appshunter.io/developer/1896755518)
- Category: Productivity, Business
- Price: $4.99
- Age rating: 4+
- Requires: iOS 17.0 · 18 MB
- Languages: American English, Dutch, French (France), German (Germany), Italian, European Portuguese, European Spanish
- Released: 2026-05-28
- Data updated: 2026-09-21
- User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/harknote/id6770582770/reviews.md

## What is HarkNote?

HarkNote is a privacy-first audio recorder and transcriber that processes your recordings on your iPhone.

Tap RECORD — that’s it. No account, no sign-in. Choose between Whisper and NVIDIA Parakeet v3; both transcribe entirely on your iPhone, with an optional live preview while recording. Your audio is not sent to us or to a cloud AI service. HarkNote downloads model assets only when needed or when you request them, and Settings lets you download, activate, switch, and remove models with live progress and a free-space check.

WHAT YOU CAN DO
• Record on demand from the app or, on supported devices, the Action Button, Control Center, or a Live Activity
• Record standalone on Apple Watch with no iPhone nearby, then transfer the session to your iPhone for transcription when the devices reconnect
• Import audio files from other apps through the iOS Share Sheet
• Turn on a live transcript preview while you speak, then get a clean final transcript
• Optionally link a recording to a calendar event using read-only calendar access
• Optionally train a local Self voice profile so high-confidence speaker matches can be tagged as Self
• Get an on-device summary and hold a conversation about the transcript using Apple’s on-device intelligence where available and a deterministic offline engine everywhere else
• Keep audio local-only, or choose iCloud Drive storage for audio sync across your own devices

PRIVACY BY DESIGN
• No analytics, crash-reporting uploads, advertising SDKs, or tracking
• Privacy nutrition label: Data Not Collected
• Your audio, transcripts, notes, questions, summaries, calendar content, voice profiles, and speaker embeddings are not sent to us
• Audio remains local by default; private iCloud storage is optional
• You own and control your recordings

WHAT TO KNOW
HarkNote is a recording tool. A consent notice is shown during onboarding and must be accepted before use. A visible recording indicator and Live Activity show when recording is active. Recording laws vary; you are responsible for obtaining any consent required where you are.

Microphone access is required. Calendar access is optional and read-only, and the app remains fully usable without it.

On-device transcription is compute-intensive, so your device may warm during long sessions. You can disable live preview in Settings to reduce load.

No subscription. No ads. No account. Just a recorder that respects you.

## Chart rankings

- #61 in Top Paid · Productivity (US App Store)


## Version history (last 5 releases)

### 1.2.1 — 2026-09-09

• Speaker labels now finish for hour-plus meetings, and a recording interrupted mid-way picks up where it left off instead of starting over.
• The speaker-labels card shows elapsed time, an estimate, and which section it is working on.

### 1.2.0 — 2026-09-08

• Apple Watch: record on your wrist and hand the audio to your iPhone for on-device transcription, with an optional live preview while you record.
• Choose which microphone records, and refuse one you don't want.
• The interface now ships in English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, and Portuguese.
• Changing the theme keeps your place in Settings; search dismisses the keyboard on return.
• A recording with no speech says so instead of guessing.
• Privacy policy v7 describes both transcription engines, Apple Foundation Models, and the Watch companion.

### 1.1.0 — 2026-08-10

Choose your transcription engine. NVIDIA Parakeet v3 joins Whisper as a selectable on-device engine — still entirely on your iPhone.

Take charge of your models. Download, switch between, and remove transcription models in Config → Transcription, with live download progress and a free-space check before anything is fetched.

Plus: the Apple Watch companion records on your wrist even with no iPhone nearby, Ask is now a real multi-turn conversation per session, and the new Snow theme.

### 1.0.6 — 2026-07-16

Redesigned recording, sessions, meetings, settings, onboarding, and privacy screens for a clearer, more consistent experience.

Long recordings now process in resumable on-device sections with safer recovery, crash-safe transcript publication, automatic summaries, clearer progress and save receipts, and stronger original-audio protection.

Also includes accessibility improvements and reliability fixes across recording, import, retry, and deletion.

### 1.0.5 — 2026-06-01

Improved recording and transcription reliability, with smaller fixes and polish throughout the app.

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*Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-09-21.*