Plaud NotePIN: A New Contender in Wearable AI Technology

The Plaud NotePin Is a Wearable AI Recording Studio for Business Pros

We were impressed with the Plaud Note's long runtime and credit card-sized form factor when we first saw it in April. Now, Plaud.AI is back with a new portable AI voice recorder that manages to be even smaller. They call it the Plaud NotePin. The company describes the NotePin as "an advanced AI note-taking device," that will "revolutionize how professionals manage their tasks" and "function as a memory capsule" to help business professionals improve their efficiency on the job. "Plaud NotePin is more than just an AI device," Nathan Hsu, CEO and Co-founder at Plaud.AI, said in a press release. "It's your always-ready Business Partner, handling mundane, daily tasks so you can concentrate on what truly drives value in your life and career. This small but powerful device is reshaping the professional landscape, allowing users to optimize their day-to-day workflow and focus on what matters most." The original Note was able to shrink its form down so far because the device offloaded nearly all of its heavier compute tasks to your connected phone. This appears to still be the case with the NotePin. The company claims that it is small enough to wear as "a wristband, a necklace, a clip, or a pin," with one-button push-to-record. Once activated the NotePin will record what it hears and transcribe it into usable notes. The device offers "enhanced AI features" through its mobile app and web portal, which run on OpenAI's latest GPT-4o large language model to label the conversation's speakers and summarize what was said. That data is encrypted on-device to prevent unauthorized snooping and the device itself offers a built-in "Find My" feature that works across mobile platforms. The company claims that the $170 NotePin can "save an estimated 260 hours per year per user." If you want to check out the NotPin for yourself, the company is currently taking pre-orders on its website and will begin selling them on Amazon in November. Note that you will also need to subscribe to an annual plan in order for the NotePin to actually work. The Starter Plan is free but only offers 300 minutes of transcription time per month. The Pro Plan increases that amount to 1200 minutes a month for an annual $80 fee. Plaud.AI is one of myriad device makers attempting to capitalize on the transformational technology behind ChatGPT, though few so far have managed to do so. The Humane AI Pin, for example, arrived to disappointing reviews after an initial period of hype. The $100 "friend" AI, on the other hand, was met with widespread derision when it debuted in July. Perhaps addressing the AI transcription needs of the business community instead of the larger public will prove sufficient to bring wearable AI technology into the mainstream. Source: Plaud.AI

Plaud takes a crack at a simpler AI pin

Successful wearables are largely confined to a few select form factors. The wrist still rules the roost or perhaps the ears, depending on how broad your definition is. Glasses are having a moment, while the ring gains traction. The pin/necklace never made much headway, though not for lack of trying. Misfit explored the space, and maybe you remember the lifelogging trend exemplified by Narrative and Memoto. The more recent generative AI push has given us Humane and Friend. The jury is still out on one of those, at least. Plaud.AI's newly announced NotePin has the most in common with the latter two examples, with AI serving as its core competency. One key difference, however, is the simplicity of its core functionality: It's a note taking device. And that's pretty much it. Where lifelogging focused on either streaming or still images, NotePin is about conversations. The device utilizes large language model-based text transcriptions. The idea is to provide a more organic method for getting words and ideas down from meetings, school or just life, while the AI does the heavy lifting of digging through the hours of your largely nonsensical ramblings. "NotePin is more than just an AI device," Plaud co-founder and CEO Nathan Hsu says in a release. "It's your always-ready business partner, handling mundane, daily tasks so you can concentrate on what truly drives value in your life and career. This small but powerful device is reshaping the professional landscape, allowing users to optimize their day-to-day workflow and focus on what matters most." That's a lot of marketing speak, particularly the bit about "reshaping the professional landscape." Among other things, the product has yet to actually launch. One thing Plaud has going for it versus the competition is an earlier product, the Plaud Note, that has both shipped and sold 200,000 units, according to the company. The GPT-4o-powered Plaud Note generated buzz. The $159 device snaps onto the back of a handset to provide note transcriptions similar to the new product. The NotePin, which hits preorder Wednesday, runs $10 more than its predecessor. The "free starter plan" gives users 300 minutes of transcription time a month. For $79 a year, users get the Pro Plan with 1,200 minutes a month and additional features like speaker labels and audio importing.

The Plaude NotePin Promises to Succeed Where Other Wearable AI Has Failed

The Plaud NotePin will act as your AI note-taking companion, though we can’t help wondering why most people won’t just use their phone. Wearable AI has not had a particularly good track record so far. This year, we’ve already seen Humane, the company behind its maligned AI pin, implode in just a few short months. The Rabbit R1 was released to similarly unfavorable reviews. Now, there’s one more company entering the arena. Instead of promising to become your ever-present AI companion, Plaud’s $169 NotePin will be your “memory capsule†for everything you do in a day. OK, perhaps it is promising to be your everything device. As described by Plaud.AI, the NotePin can be worn as a necklace, pin, or wristband. Once active, it essentially takes a transcription of your thoughts and conversations for later. Think of it like the age-old voice recorder, though it uses a large language model to summarize audio. This works with the Plaud app to format your meetings or notes into either transcriptions or summaries. That would be fine and dandy, but in Plaud’s press release, the company describes how the pin “learns and understands its users over time to perform routine tasks before and after important meetings or events.†It’s not clear exactly how that comes up from basic use. Users still need to press a button to start the recording and manually select which templates they want their AI transcriptions and summaries put into the Plaud app. The pin is up for preorder on Wednesday and should start shipping in November. At the very least, the Plaud pin fits a specific use case compared to Avi Schiffmann’s “Friend†AI wearable, which promises to text you as a form of artificially engendered comfort. It won’t act as a call-and-response device for ChatGPT. Compared to its rivals in the AI device space, Plaid claims its NotePin will last 40 days in standby mode. Otherwise, it will last for 20 hours of continuous recording. Compare that with the Humane pin, which was reported to last a few hours. However, like every other AI doohickey we’ve seen over the past few months, the NotePin won’t be processing any AI on the device. The basic starter plan comes with voice-to-text transcriptions, “visualized mind-maps,†and speaker labels for your transcriptions. However, you only get 300 minutes of transcription, and if you want more, you’ll need to pay $79 a year (or $6.60 a month) for the Pro Plan. That comes with 1,200 minutes of transcription time per month and more templates. The device maker said paying users will also get “more enhanced features†in the future. We asked Plaud if it has a roadmap for future features, but we did not immediately hear back. It will rely on cloud services, but this time, the company promises “industry-leading encryption.†The company’s privacy policy page claims it uses transport layer security protocols, plus data hashing to keep users’ details safe. Privacy has been a sticking point for recent AI devices. Rabbit has tried to fight back against the claims of a hacker and developer collective that it allowed anybody at the company access to users’ prompts through its API keys. Plaud already sells its $159 handheld Plaud Note, which describes itself as a device with GPT-4o transcription capabilities. The NotePin doesn’t explain which LLM it’s using for its summarization services, though it’s likely consistent. Considering how you can already use OpenAI’s whisper AI for speech-to-text transcription, Perhaps it's best to describe the Plaud NotePin as an all-in-one voice recorder and transcriber. That’s a far more mundane, though enticing proposition for folks like me in the media business. Still, when phones like the Pixel 9 already advertise a similar service for calls, it is more difficult to justify spending $170 or more on a specific wearable. The hype of calling it your “always ready business partner,†as described by CEO Nathan Hsu in the company’s press release, makes it seem less enticing. We’re still waiting for the one device that will make a case for AI-specific hardware. None have truly set the bar. On Wednesday, AI art generator Midjourney announced on Twitter it was “getting into hardware.†What that means is up to speculation, but considering how much of a gimmick AI image generators are on most phones with them, we hope that whatever the company creates won’t be wearable to make poorly composed AI non-art.

This new AI pin could be the personal transcriptionist I've been waiting for - if it works

The Plaud AI NotePin is a wearable AI device that satisfies one very simple need for many professions. I've been testing it out, and here are my first impressions. Note-taking is a big part of my job. I have over 90 notes in the Apple Notes app that I switch between for different purposes, whether it's a story idea, some quotes from a press briefing, interview transcriptions, or even my grocery and to-do lists. One of these notes includes snippets from a demo by a company that is using artificial intelligence (AI) to fix this problem: Plaud. Also: Why Claude's Artifacts is the coolest feature I've seen in generative AI so far Plaud just announced its new NotePin, a wearable AI-powered device that can record your voice and transcribe and summarize what you say, turning your notes into a searchable database of information. The Plaud NotePin was born out of the necessity to have AI work with real life instead of data available online, Plaud CEO Nathan Hsu said during a recent press briefing. The device is a small pill-shaped gadget that you can wear around your neck, on your clothes as a pin, on your wrist with a wristband, or clipped to your jacket or bag. And, yes, all these wearable options are included in the box, so you don't have to buy a separate wristband if you decide to start wearing it on your wrist instead of as a pin. Also: Humane Ai Pin reviews: 5 takeaways on a promising but dangerously flawed wearable During meetings, you can press the NotePin, which will buzz to signal the beginning of the recording. Once the meeting concludes, you can stop recording, and the NotePin will transcribe the recording. You can find the transcription and an AI-generated summary of what was discussed in an app. The summaries are scannable and searchable, so you could potentially ask the AI assistant in the app to search for that meeting when you discussed "Y's project deadlines." I use ChatGPT and other AI tools daily to help with workflow, answer questions, or perform automated tasks at home. I'm also an avid note-taker, as I believe many writers are, and used to carry a notepad around before smartphones were a thing so that I could jot down any idea that came to mind when out and about. I also enjoy dictating my notes, even more so since I have physical limitations due to illness. Also: 5 free AI tools for school that students, teachers, and parents can use, too I'm used to asking Alexa to control a light or smart device at home. On the go, I often use Siri to call someone or reply to a text message. The only thing I don't like using Siri for is writing down my notes, specifically because of how inefficient the virtual assistant can be. I like that NotePin lets you quickly give it long or short notes, it's easy to use, and it can effortlessly go anywhere you go. I can use it to record interviews, jot down lists, or even dictate a story idea or outline on the go. The Plaud NotePin is perfect for these and other use cases. If Plaud can guarantee security and privacy guardrails for healthcare, I can imagine doctors wearing a Plaud NotePin around their necks to dictate notes between patients instead of having to stop to write down something on their laptops. It's also great for meetings in general, especially project planning discussions. The NotePin could also be an accessibility aid for those with limited mobility or visual and auditory impairments. Of course, the device has its limitations. It can make errors during the transcription process, which can affect the summary and the searching capabilities. This is expected with AI wearables, as they're mostly still in the early stages of development, but it is an important factor to consider when deciding between this product or a phone app that performs a similar function. Also: Google's Gemini just got two popular ChatGPT Plus features - and one is free to use Available for purchase at $169, the NotePin lets you record up to 300 minutes of audio a month without a subscription. Consumers can also subscribe for a $79-a-year membership to record up to 1,200 minutes per month and extra features, like labels for each speaker. The NotePin is available in gray, white, and purple. I'll conduct more in-depth tests with the Plaud AI NotePin over the next few days and update this article with my findings.

Plaud introduces an ultra-light wearable AI-powered NotePin device - SiliconANGLE

Plaud's new device is described as an ultra-thin, ultra-light wearable device that acts as a "memory capsule" to help users improve their productivity and efficiency in their work and school life. It looks like a white, black or purple pill and comes in multiple form factors that can be worn as a necklace, wristband, clip or a pin. "Plaud NotePin is more than just an AI device," said Nathan Hsu, chief executive and co-founder at Plaud. "It's your always-ready business partner, handling mundane, daily tasks so you can concentrate on what truly drives value in your life and career. This small but powerful device is reshaping the professional landscape, allowing users to optimize their day-to-day workflow and focus on what matters most." The device acts as a voice recorder that is activated when the user presses a button. After that the AI function takes over and labels every speaker in the conversation, assists with making note summaries, and bullet points and provides multiple professional templates for meetings or lectures. The AI enhancements are available through Plaud's mobile app and the web. The company said that users can choose between the latest and most powerful models from OpenAI and Anthropic PBC including GPT-4o and Claude 3.5 Sonnet respectively, with more to come in the future. Using these models, users can ask questions like "What do I need to deliver on the Brooklyn project?" to search through notes. The pin provides an extremely long battery lifetime of up to 40 days on standby and 20 hours of continuous recording time. Plaud.AI's device joins several other AI wearables that have come onto the scene attempting to bring AI-powered assistants into the everyday lives of users. However, it's a slimmed-down experience in comparison to other contenders. Humane, for example, sought to replace the smartphone with an all-in-one AI-powered wearable "smart pin" akin to a badge that could see, hear and understand the world around the user and respond to their queries. Rabbit Inc. rolled out a small square device called the Rabbit R1 that can interact with apps using natural voice commands, such as book flights set calendar events, and answer questions, for example how to make meals. While the wearable AI market has been heating up, AI assistants have been moving onto smartphones as the hardware on mobile devices has become better suited to host them and companies have offloaded their computing power onto the cloud. Google LLC is in the process of trading out its smart assistant "Hey, Google," and has begun to offer its powerful Gemini AI model on Android devices to answer questions and provide on-device assistance. The Plaud NotePin costs $169 and can be pre-ordered today with the first batch shipping in late September. Although users can get a subscription to a service for $6.60 a month that provides 1,200 monthly transcription minutes and over 20 professional templates and access to "Ask AI" in beta - the ability to chat with their notes - the starter tier is free which has 300 transcription minutes and 9 templates.

Watch out, there's a new AI pin in town that can transcribe all your conversations

I'm not gonna sugarcoat it. Standalone AI devices have crashed and burned harder than the Hindenburg. They are, as one might say, not ready for prime time. Heck, the jury's still out on AI for smartphones. However, the show must go on, so here's another AI pin that will likely cause Marques Brownlee's hair to fall out when it officially launches. The Plaud NotePin that plagued rival products by limiting the scope. This thing isn't a purported digital assistant that will streamline every aspect of modern life. It's a note-taking device, albeit one with some AI bells and whistles. The NotePin automatically records and transcribes conversations, and that's pretty much it. I could see this being useful for students, stopping the cruel punishment known as "jotting down notes." The same goes for people stuck in an endless kaleidoscope of meetings. The AI comes into play in a number of ways. First of all, this thing isn't stuck on English. The pin can transcribe and translate 59 languages, with more on the way. It also, allegedly, will pay attention to context to correctly name each speaker and organize the talk into something resembling a script. Finally, there's an AI analysis component that summarizes everything. This data can be accessed via a chat window, so you can ask specific questions about any of the dozens of conversations you've had while wearing the pin. The NotePin is small and light, with the company saying it weighs about the same as a AA battery. This form factor will let users pin it just about anywhere, so it won't be quite as obvious as the scalding-hot (and heavy) Humane AI pin. Pre-orders are available now, and it's fairly reasonable at $170. However, an $80 annual subscription is required if you want to record more than 300 minutes of audio per month. But I'm not done. Here's where things get weird. This is just the first step in the company's plans toward something grandiose. Plaud hopes to one day use the trove of recordings to create a "digital twin" of each user, . "Someday, you're going to be able to utilize AI to reproduce yourself -- create this real digital twin. That's kind of this grand mission, where we think if we're able to help users connect to so many memories, it's going to be grand," said Plaud CEO Nathan Hsu. However, Hsu says this dream may take "decades" to achieve, so at least he's being realistic, unlike every other AI company out there. Also, I don't want a digital twin. One of me is enough, thank you very much. For now, though, there's the NotePin. I don't see any reason why it shouldn't work (mostly) as advertised. I also don't see why anyone would need it when they already carry around a computer with a microphone that could very easily house software to do everything the NotePin can do. Shrug.