What Is iPhone Visual Voicemail & Transcription?

Visual voicemail and voicemail transcription track voice messages that have been left after missed calls easier.

15:44 28 April 2022

Apple is one of the most innovative brands ever. The brand keeps coming up with innovative products and even better features for its devices. One of the greatest Apple inventions is the iPhone visual voicemail & transcription. This feature makes checking iPhone voice messages quicker and easier. However, not every carrier supports this feature.

What is the iPhone visual voicemail & transcription?
The iPhone has two telephone features; visual voicemail and voicemail transcription. Their purpose is to make tracking voice messages that have been left after missed calls easier. Despite the massive shift to modern communication techniques like video calls and text messages, voicemails are not obsolete. However, voicemails can be time-consuming and incredibly frustrating. With some help from advanced technology, these challenges can be eliminated.

An in-depth look into the iPhone visual voicemail and transcription
This feature was introduced in 2007 with the first iPhone. It revolutionized how people check their voicemails and separate each call from others. Before this, users would play each voice message by a caller sequentially. Many smartphones and conventional carriers still use this technique. With the voicemail transcription, users can convert their voice messages into text format. Instead of spending too much time listening to voice messages, users can read them as transcripts. Reading the messages is much faster than hearing a playback in real-time. While reading, users can skim over less important messages and skip to the most important ones.

A guide for using iPhone voicemail
While this is an incredible feature, it can be challenging because computers do not always comprehend human speech correctly. Therefore, there are numerous cases when the message transcript is too flawed and inaccurate that users still need to listen to the actual voice message. This creates more work than before. However, if the transcript and the voice message are in the same place, it doesn’t have to be hard. Combining the iPhone visual voicemail, transcription, and voice playback features makes it easy to read and listen to the messages. It also makes it easy to manage voice messages. Activating iPhone’s visual voicemail means showing a list of messages. The times, dates, and callers will also be given. iPhone also provides a playback button that allows you to listen to the audio if you need to.

Below is an easy breakdown for using the transcribe voicemail iPhone feature;

• Open the app on your iPhone
• Tap on the voicemail option. You should find it at the bottom of the screen
• Select the voicemail you wish to read
• You should see a paragraph of the text on top of the play button. This is the transcription of the voicemail. You can read the message here.
• If you want to listen to the voicemail after or while reading the transcript, you can tap on the play button
• If the transcript is satisfactory, you don’t need to listen to the voicemail again
• Once you are done, you can choose to keep the message and the transcript for later reference or delete it

Steps for setting up and turning off iPhone visual voicemail and transcription
The first thing you must do is set up your iPhone voicemail. Once you have set up voicemail on your iPhone, you can proceed to activate the visual voicemail and transcription feature. Setting it up is relatively easy because it is usually set as a default feature. It works on devices running on at least iOS 10. This means that iPhone 6S and earlier versions do not have this default feature. It is also worth mentioning that it works on the iPhone 6S, SE, 13, and all new models.

 

Since the visual voicemail and transcription element is a default feature, you do not have to do much to set it up. However, the problem comes in if you want to turn it off.

While the feature can be incredibly beneficial, it can also be annoying. The transcripts can make it hard to go through your voicemails by filling up the screen. If you do not need the feature, you can turn it off. The process of turning off voicemail transcription is not straightforward. However, you can work your way around it with the right tips. Below is a step by step guide for turning off this feature;

• Open the Settings app on your iPhone
• Click on Siri & Search
• Tap on language
• Change the language to Indian or Australian English or any language that doesn’t sound like English
• Click on change language

This may seem like a strange procedure. However, you will notice that the voicemail transcripts are no longer available once you are done.

 

Conclusion
It is worth mentioning that your carrier must support visual voicemail and transcription for this feature to work on your phone. This is regardless of what iPhone model or version you have. Therefore, if you are unsure if your carrier supports this feature, you can ask or do your research. Even if the feature is not 100% perfect, it gives you an idea of what the person who left the voicemail was trying to say.