HappyScribe vs. Clideo: Which Tool is Right for You?

Is a multi-purpose tool better or one that focuses on a few key tasks? When you’re looking for an AI transcription tool, it’s common to come across several options that handle varying features and are built with different purposes in mind. Fortunately, you can look at key categories, such as accuracy, language support, collaboration, and security, to help you decide.

If you’re debating between HappyScribe and Clideo, here’s what you should know to choose the right tool for your needs.

What is HappyScribe?

HappyScribe is a language services tool that helps with transcription, translation, and subtitling. It’s built to handle speech-heavy content, such as podcasts, interviews, and speeches. You can use it to turn videos and audio into a text-based format, create summaries, add translated subtitles, and more.

HappyScribe is a professional and focused solution that offers several features that help you collaborate with your team, work efficiently, and ensure accuracy while producing global content at scale.

What is Clideo?

Clideo is primarily a video editing solution. It offers several tools to help you make basic video edits, such as cuts, merging files, cropping, and adding basic effects.

Clideo can add subtitles, perform audio or video-to-text transcription, and translate audio or video files. However, Clideo’s subtitling, transcription, and translation features act as more of an add-on to its primary video editing solutions than true primary features. It can make it feel more basic than the professional solutions you get with HappyScribe.

We’ll compare both HappyScribe and Clideo in more depth in the rest of this article so you can see the pros and cons of both options.

Key Differences Between HappyScribe and Clideo

1. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: user experience

HappyScribe: user experience

When you log in to HappyScribe, you’ll notice it feels like a true professional transcription, translation, and subtitling tool. It’s organized and easy to navigate, so you can quickly figure out how to start projects, upload files, and adjust settings to your liking.

Key features that contribute to a professional user experience in HappyScribe are:

• A clear focus: Tasks like audio-to-text or video-to-text transcription and translation are the primary focus for HappyScribe. It makes it much more organized to perform the tasks you need to complete efficiently.
• Interactive editor: HappyScribe’s interactive editor is an element that stands out in this comparison, and you don’t get the same experience with Clideo. HappyScribe’s editor will let you review transcripts side-by-side with the video or audio file, making it easy to review and adjust the output as needed.
• Ask AI anything: You’ll also find an option to “Ask AI Anything” at the top of the editor. That’ll allow you to use several preset prompts or input your own prompts to summarize transcripts, generate blog posts, pull important quotes, and more to make working on text-based content easier.
• Proofreading helper: HappyScribe’s proofreading helper will highlight any sections of text that the AI was unsure of while transcribing or translating to help you review outputs more efficiently.
• Advanced features: HappyScribe offers several advanced features to make your transcripts, translations, and subtitles more consistent, such as style guides, glossaries, time stamping, and automatic speaker labeling.

Clideo: user experience

The user experience with Clideo will feel a lot different than HappyScribe since it’s focused on video editing.

When you log in, Clideo puts the video editor front and center. It makes it easy to add video files, start new projects, and get editing right away. However, some of the add-on features, like transcription, translation, and subtitling, are buried deeper in the menus, so you have to look through different options to find them.

Once you navigate the menus, performing video transcription or translation in Clideo will feel a lot different than what you get with HappyScribe. Clideo doesn’t actually give you a text-based editor like you’ll have in HappyScribe. Instead, it just automatically adds transcripts as subtitles to the video you uploaded.

To get a true transcript from Clideo, you’ll have to use the option they give you to download it as a TXT file. Then, you can copy and paste that into a different word processor, like a Google Doc or Word Doc, to edit it and format it to your liking.

With that setup, you lose out on a lot of the advanced transcription and translation features you get with HappyScribe, such as the AI assistant, proofreading helper, style guides, glossaries, and automatic speaker labeling. So, while Clideo is great for video editing, the transcripts can feel lackluster for businesses and content teams looking for a more in-depth solution.

2. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: accuracy

HappyScribe: accuracy

HappyScribe has verified accuracy rates for transcriptions of 95% on AI-only outputs and 99% with expert proofreading. The option for added expert human proofreading is a great feature that can help you achieve better accuracy on important content.

AI-only outputs are available within minutes, and expert proofreading is delivered within 24 hours. Professionals on a tight deadline can also add rush orders for expert proofreading to speed up the process.

The team behind HappyScribe cares about providing continuously high-quality results. HappyScribe is tested and trained daily on 12,000+ hours of content each year to ensure it continues to perform at its best and to keep expanding its language capabilities.

You can also use features like HappyScribe’s Glossaries feature to improve the consistency of outputs. The Glossaries feature allows you to correct any words that are frequently misspelled, such as people’s names or company-specific terminology. All you have to do is add the correct spelling to your glossary to have the software correct it going forward.

Clideo: accuracy

Clideo doesn’t list an accuracy rate on its website for transcription, so it’s hard to determine how well it’ll perform over a high volume of content.

Clideo also doesn’t mention how often it tests its transcription, translation, and subtitling features to maintain quality and improve them, and they don’t have a glossary feature to correct any frequent misspellings.

Clideo’s transcription and translation features do feel like more of an add-on compared to their video editing tools, so it’s safe to assume they might put less time into developing those. Whereas HappyScribe puts a lot of deep focus into its transcription and translation tools with regular testing because that’s what the platform is built for.

3. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: language support

HappyScribe: language support

HappyScribe has a wide range of supported languages to satisfy global content production needs. HappyScribe can transcribe in 120+ languages and translate in 65+ languages with AI-only outputs. You can also opt for expert proofreading in 85+ languages when you’re translating or creating translated subtitles.

On top of that, HappyScribe provides several other advanced features that contribute to well-rounded language support:

• It provides several localization features to ensure your translated text or subtitles meet accessibility standards, such as complying with Subtitles for the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing (SDH).
• It offers a side-by-side editor to make it easy to compare the original text and the translated text.
• You can use the Glossaries feature to correct any common misspellings that happen during translation, such as people’s names.
• It offers an AI-powered subtitle syncing feature that will line up translated subtitles with shot changes to create a good viewing experience. Subtitle timing can also be adjusted manually as needed.

"Happy Scribe didn’t just save us time—it helped us reach entirely new markets. We’re now engaging audiences in North America, Asia, and beyond. Canada, Mexico, Japan, and China are some of our biggest growth areas."

- Samuel Rostein, Channel Manager at Logicomix

Clideo: language support

Clideo has 74+ languages and dialects on the platform that it can transcribe and translate in. However, Clideo does note that the software provides better results for some languages than others.

Clideo lists English, French, Spanish, and German as the primary languages it focuses on, and notes that common translations like English to Spanish will have the best accuracy.

It also doesn’t offer the side-by-side editor, localization features, glossaries, or automatic subtitle syncing features that you get with HappyScribe.

Those limitations can make it hard to use Clideo when trying to produce professional content for global audiences, where you need high levels of accuracy to connect with viewers.

4. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: workflow

HappyScribe: workflow

HappyScribe’s workflow is built around features that help with collaboration and efficiency during professional use. Features that contribute to that are:

• Multi-user collaboration: You can share project files with your team.
• Create an organized system: HappyScribe allows you to create folders with custom names so you can organize all your project files.
• Subtitle styling: You can adjust the font, size, color, appearance, weight, and position of subtitles added to videos to ensure they match your branding and video’s theme.
• Speaker tagging and timestamps: HappyScribe provides settings you can activate to automatically add speaker tags with timestamps. It’ll make your transcripts more organized for easy review.
• Advanced features for efficiency: HappyScribe provides several additional features in the platform to make your workflow more efficient. For example, you can use the audio summarizer to quickly gather key points or the audio converter to easily change file types.

Each of these features is organized in the platform in a way that’s easy to use and accessible to reduce the learning curve when you get started.

"Last year, we were still transcribing in January. With HappyScribe, we had everything sorted by October. The speed difference is huge."

- Georgie Nicholls, Production Manager at Twofour

Clideo: workflow

Clideo’s workflow is much more focused on video editing. The video editor is the main part of the platform you’ll be working in while using most of the tools Clideo offers. That can detract from the workflow when working on tasks like transcription or translation that aren’t Clideo’s main focus. Those features feel more like add-ons that aren’t completely built out.

Aside from that, one of the major drawbacks of Clideo is that it doesn’t have an option to collaborate with your team on the platform. It’s more of a platform for simple projects and individual use. That’ll lead to issues for businesses that want to add it into professional workflows.

Additionally, it lacks other helpful features that HappyScribe offers, such as creating custom folders for project files, speaker tagging, and creating audio summaries. Plus, while it offers some subtitle styling options, it doesn’t have quite as much customization as HappyScribe does for elements like subtitle weight and appearance.

5. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: security

HappyScribe: security

HappyScribe takes user security and privacy seriously. As a European-based company, HappyScribe is fully GDPR compliant to ensure high security standards while processing and handling information.

Additionally, HappyScribe provides further layers of security by being SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and offering secure single sign-on (SSO) login.

Clideo: security

Clideo is a company based in Germany that is also fully GDPR compliant. However, Clideo isn’t SOC 2 compliant, so that is an important consideration when looking for tools for business use that you want to be as secure as possible. Clideo also doesn’t offer SSO login since it’s a platform built for individual use.

6. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: pricing

HappyScribe: pricing

HappyScribe offers a pay-as-you-go option and monthly subscriptions at different tiers that go as follows:

• Pay-as-you-go: $12 per 60 minutes
• Lite: $9 per month
• Pro: $29 per month
• Business: $89 per month

You can also get a 33-34% discount on monthly subscriptions with an annual plan, or start with a limited free trial before paying.

Clideo: pricing

Clideo offers a monthly subscription at $9 per month or an annual plan for $72 per year. Both plans are just for one user.

7. HappyScribe vs. Clideo: best use cases

HappyScribe: best use cases

HappyScribe is best for businesses and professionals who want a dedicated transcription, translation, and subtitling solution. Its verified accuracy rates, great language support, collaborative workflow, and high security standards all make it a top fit for professional use.

Best use cases for HappyScribe include:

• Reducing subtitle creation and editing times. (Read how Welcome to the Jungle reduced editing time by 50% with it)
• Making audio content such as radio broadcasts and podcasts compliant with accessibility needs, such as adding SDH subtitles. (See how it helped Biola University while reducing their costs by 80%)
• Translating educational content to increase accessibility for global audiences. (See how it helped Growth Tribe)
• Repurposing videos, podcasts, interviews, and other speech-heavy content into text-based formats
• Creating summaries for long-form video or audio content
• Facilitating collaboration across large-scale teams

Clideo: best use cases

Clideo is best used for video editing when you want to make cuts, add imagery, or add effects to your content. It’s a platform that’s built for personal use and small projects, and will have many limitations for teams that want a collaborative solution.

While it offers transcription, translation, and subtitling features, those are more of add-ons than true professional solutions for businesses and content teams that need high levels of accuracy and efficiency.

Final Verdict on HappyScribe vs. Clideo: Which should you choose?

Businesses and content teams that want a true professional transcription, translation, and subtitling tool will want to use HappyScribe. Those features are HappyScribe’s main focus, and the team behind it puts in effort to continuously test and train the software to ensure high-quality results. HappyScribe stands out for its:

• Verified accuracy rates of 95% on AI-only outputs and 99% with expert proofreading
• Well-rounded language support with 120+ supported languages
• Options for collaboration for professional teams
• Advanced features such as glossaries, style guides, and subtitle syncing that improve quality and consistency
• Security measures with full GDPR and SOC 2 Type 2 compliance

When you’re looking for a simple and accessible video editing solution for small projects and individual use, Clideo is a great choice for that use case. However, as a professional transcription, translation, and subtitling tool, it falls short in several categories that won’t make it the best fit.

Get started with HappyScribe today

HappyScribe is a transcription, translation, and subtitling option with verified accuracy, great language support, and a collaborative workflow that’s a great fit for professional use. Sign up today to try it for yourself!