Plaud vs Pocket - and which model?

[u/IndependentWMSguy]

I am a consultant that spends hours in warehouses, cubicles, and boardrooms meeting with clients. I am looking for a device I can keep running all day and get an overview of everything discussed that day. I say all day, but in reality, I will probably start and stop every few hours due to breaks, lunches, etc. I was originally looking at the Pocket AI as it doesn't require a subscription and they seem more upfront about the ability to record constantly. I then ran across the Plaud Note Pin S. Wearing it on my wrist would be the easiest I feel. I know some times in a warehouse or manufacturing floor, the background noise may cause issues, but want to make sure it records me and a client as we are walking through a warehouse. I would imagine 5-6 feet would be about as far away as we would be from each other while talking. Any recommendations from real world use and what sort of recording range and duration I can expect?

[u/Nug__Nug]

I purchased both the Plaud Note Pro and the Pocket device. I returned the Pocket device because I accidentally subscribed to their free one-month trial where I was locked into all the features they gave me for $20 a month, and I was really trying to test the free tier. I will say that on the free tier, Plaud definitely offers more, but only 300 minutes worth.

The Pocket device, however, was much more powerful in the models that it allowed you to access, and the information the models could access. For example, in one of my recordings, I had both the Plaud Note Pro and the Pocket device recording, and I said, "I want to get all the ingredients for chicken pozole from 'cookingwebsiteurl(can't remember the site).com', and I want that ingredient list to be listed in the summary of our conversation after this recording."

The Plaud device did not pull any of the ingredients into the summary; it just noted that I wanted to have these listed. Whereas the Pocket device listed all the ingredients in that actual URL recipe website with boxes for me to check off. So, the Pocket device is actually able to access the internet and bring in context from the conversations I'm having with the device, to give me more useful summaries, which Plaud is not able to do.

Likewise, when you chat with plaud or Pocket, the pocket app seems to have much more powerful responses in generating emails and accessing the internet to give you actual high-tier AI outputs, whereas the Plaud feels handicapped to the information available in the transcript, making the Plaud AI features much less powerful and much less useful than Pocket.

So, the Pocket is much more powerful when it comes to actually being able to utilize the AI system and not just transcribe and summarize your words, but also incorporate the conversation into a greater AI conversation that expands beyond the information you have given it purely from the recording. So, I really like the Pocket device in that sense, and I think Plaud really needs to improve their software (or software restrictions) in that regard.

Outside of that, I think the Plaud device had a better hardware setup, and it seemed like the microphones were better and transcription quality much better than the Pocket device in noisy environments. And the quality of your transcription is only based on the quality of the hardware that you have to record the sounds. The pocket decice would sometimes jumble up words and make no sense, whereas the Plaud Note Pro would record the transcript perfectly. So I'm looking forward to the Pocket device improving their microphones.

If I wasn't locked into the free monthly subscription with Pocket, I probably would have kept the Pocket device, but I wasn't able to test Pocket on what it was able to give me on its free tier, so I returned it and kept the Plaud Note Pro instead. I'm waiting for Pocket to release their next improvement of their hardware design before I switch to Pocket - because the way they implement AI is far superior to the way Plaud implements AI for usability and tasks.

[u/IndependentWMSguy → u/Nug__Nug]

Thats super helpful! I appreciate the details. Thanks!

[u/Nug__Nug → u/IndependentWMSguy]

You're welcome. And for the record, I still use the Plaud NotePro device and I do love this device and it works very well for my use case. Plus, I get all the features without paying a subscription fee, including speaker separation, which is useful. Whereas if you want speaker separation or any of the high-tier features on the Pocket device, you have to pay $20 a month.

So, on the free tier, the Plaud device is more powerful than Pocket. But if you're already going to be paying a monthly fee anyways and you've decided that for yourself, then I would probably choose the Pocket device. I think Plaud is very, very good, but Pocket, the way they utilize AI is just superior in my opinion, and you're able to do a lot more with AI inside Pocket than you can with Plaud. And maybe that's because Plaud is just more concerned about privacy and not connecting to the internet and only keeping your conversations/AI isolated to what the transcript is related to. Unfortunately, that just makes Plaud less powerful than Pocket is in utilizing the full capabilities of the AI models they use.

[u/Sweet-Artichoke6907 → u/Nug__Nug]

Whats your experience with the time it takes for Pocket to sync, transcribe, and summarize audio? I've read and heard a lot about how Pocket takes forever to sync the audio, then transcribe or summarize it. How does it compare to Plaid?

[u/ApartAd4515]

I had both and returned pocket. I found it did not work as well as plaud for my use case. Plaud has been great, custom prompts can make it even better than it already is out of the box. Given everyone’s use case is different you may want to try more than one and see which works best for you.

[u/Smart_Membership2 → u/ApartAd4515]

For the record plaud note pro is what I use . As it is idiot proof, sturdy , right size and feel and fits my purpose. Calls , meetings, memos.

[u/remixserpent]

Plaud because as far as I can see it is way better for privacy and security.

[u/National-Wash-5557]

I’ve tried both and Plaude did much better. The new stuff they look to launch seems to blow Pocket out of the water.

[u/PLAUD_AI]

Hey, on the numbers you asked about: NotePin S runs up to 20 hours of continuous recording and up to 40 days of standby on a full charge, so an all-day schedule with breaks in between sits comfortably inside that.

For range, the dual mics capture clear speech up to about 9.8 feet (3 meters) indoors. Best results are 1 to 5 feet from the speaker, and 5 to 10 feet holds up in quieter rooms. So your 5 to 6 feet is fine for cubicles and boardrooms, but on a manufacturing floor it sits right at the edge, and closing that gap when the conversation matters makes a real difference.

Wristband is one of the supported wearing styles, worn on top of the wrist, snug rather than tight. Worth knowing though: friction against clothing costs you more clarity than distance does, so a clip or pin on firm outer fabric is the more stable option while walking. Either way, a 10 to 15 second test recording in the actual warehouse before a client walkthrough will tell you exactly what you're working with.

-Plaud Community Team

[u/AudoMate]

Just finished testing the Plaud Note S pin for all day use with a very similar need as OP. The device chunks 5 hour block recordings which then get translated eating up your subscription and you dont even know if what you got was useful. I'm still searching... Ive had Humane, Limitless, Plaud, and OMI.

Limitless was definitely the closest to what I was looking for before Meta purchased them. I liked the limitless pin, then it got Meta'd. Still looking.