Voice Recognition: Google vs Apple

After two decades of false starts I think voice recognition, or speech to text translation, has finally come of age.  Lately in both Spanish and English I find I am able to speak and have smartphones transcribe most of what I am saying.  This is true both in Apple and Google.  But because I use an Android and an iPhone on a daily basis I wanted to test who has the best voice recognition technology, Apple or Google?

So what I did is simultaneously speak into the Mail app of my iPhone 5S and the Gmail app of my Android Samsung 5, both connected to the same Fon WiFi network with Movistar fiber optic service behind them, in Alcobendas, Spain.  Then I sent emails to myself. And these are the results.

Apple Dictation

These is a test to determine which system works better if the voice recognition off the iPhone or the voice recognition of android so what I am doing is I am dictating two emails simultaneously door and iPhone and android on I’m checking which operating system understands me better

Google Dictation

This is a test to determine which system works better if the voice recognition of the iPhone or the voice recognition of Android so what I am doing is I am dictating to emails simultaneously 21 iPhone and Android on I’m checking which operating system understands me better

Even though both operating systems made mistakes Google made a few less and is the winner here.  Especially because on Android you see each word as you speak and in iOS you have to wait until you finish and hit done to see how well your spoken English was transformed into written English.

And this is the test in Spanish:

Google

Esto es una prueba en la que quiero comprobar la calidad del sistema de reconocimiento de voz de los dos sistemas operativos el de Google y el día todo lo que quiero ver es cuál de los dos sistemas entiende mejor mi castellano

Apple

Esto es una prueba en la que quiero comprobar la calidad del sistema de reconocimiento de voz de los dos sistemas operativos el de google y el de apoyo lo que quiero ver es cuál de los dos sistemas entiende mejor a mi castellano

In Spanish both Operating Systems did equally well.  They both got everything right except the word Apple.  But again I prefer the immediate feedback that Google gives you as you speak. Also Google did much better understanding my name out of all the email addresses.  Apple had a much harder time on email address dictation, I don’t know why.

Spanish is my native language but I am very fluent in English so it is not surprising that there were a few less mistakes in Spanish.

My conclusion after this test is that both Apple and Google are finally offering true voice recognition but that Google has a slight advantage.

• Apple
• Google
• speech recognition software