Stenographer vs FocusTap
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Stenographer
This app offers on-device audio recording and transcription, ensuring complete privacy as your data never leaves your device. It utilizes advanced AI for accurate speech processing, summarization, and multilingual support, with a one-time purchase for unlimited use.
- 100% on-device processing
- No subscriptions, one-time purchase
- Discreet background recording
- AI-powered transcription and summarization
- Intelligent search and tagging
- Multilingual transcription and translation
- Cross-device synchronization
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Your conversations are valuable. They should also stay private. Stenographer records, transcribes, identifies speakers, summarizes, and organizes audio directly on your iPhone or iPad. Capture from your phone or Apple Watch, then turn hours of audio into a readable, searchable record without sending your conversations to a transcription service. NEW IN STENOGRAPHER 2.0 • Seamless Transcript Read recordings as one continuous, newspaper-like conversation. Stenographer hides file splits and processing chunks while preserving the original audio behind every turn. • Know who said what Private, on-device speaker diarization separates conversations into natural speaker turns. Name a speaker and Stenographer can use an on-device voice profile to recognize that person in other recordings when there’s a confident match. • Private AI summaries On supported devices, summaries and labels use Apple’s on-device Foundation Models. An optional downloadable local fallback is available, and your transcripts remain on your device. • Record from your wrist Start recording from Apple Watch when reaching for your phone would interrupt the moment. Finished recordings remain queued on Apple Watch and retry until iPhone safely receives them for private transcription and analysis. MORE WAYS TO WORK • Continue recording in the background from iPhone or Apple Watch • Import existing audio files • Automatically detect supported languages • Transcribe speech or translate supported languages into English • Search across transcripts, summaries, and labels • Add labels and optional timestamps • Select exact transcript turns to share • Merge recordings and export all transcripts as JSON • Customize transcript fonts, speaker display, processing concurrency, and recording limits • Return to the classic per-recording layout at any time PRIVATE BY DESIGN Transcription, speaker identification, summaries, and labels run on your device whenever available. Nothing is uploaded unless you explicitly choose to share it. Speaker and optional fallback models may download when needed; your audio and transcripts are not uploaded for processing. ONE PURCHASE. NO SUBSCRIPTION. Record and transcribe without monthly fees, usage quotas, or cloud transcription charges. Ideal for meetings, lectures, interviews, research, personal notes, and private lifelogging. App icon designed by aaatelier.ch.
FocusTap
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Focus Tap is a free and open source alternative to many other screen time apps.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: FocusTap at Free against Stenographer's $4.99. Stenographer's advantage is device support (3 vs 1). On ads, in-app purchases and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
FocusTap is free to download; Stenographer costs $4.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
| Parameter | Stenographer | FocusTap |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $4.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.3 (3 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 87.5% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 3 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 5 days | — |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 17.5 | 16.4 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 575 MB | 2 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Caleb Phillips | Trevor Walker |
In-app purchases
Stenographer
No in-app purchases
FocusTap
No in-app purchases









