MAI-Transcribe-2 $0.10 per hour through Dec 31, 2026 vs Sume STT

Microsoft says MAI-Transcribe-2 "will be priced at $0.10 per hour through December 31, 2026". That window is the whole offer: the post does not state a price after that date. Sume's speech-to-text is $0.01 per audio minute, which is $0.60 for an hour of audio.

The Microsoft price is from its announcement post; the Sume rate from the rate card and the video inspect docs, read 2026-10-01. Sume's default agent fee is not included in the Sume column.

What exactly did Microsoft price?

The post says MAI-Transcribe-2 is available in public preview through Azure Speech and that "at launch" it is priced at $0.10 per hour through December 31, 2026. It gives no rate for 2027 onward, so a budget that runs past that date has an unknown line in it.

What does that look like next to Sume's per-minute rate?

Straight multiplication. One hour is 60 audio minutes, so $0.10 per hour is about $0.0017 per minute, and Sume's $0.01 per minute is $0.60 per hour.

How does Sume reserve the spend?

Sume bills per audio minute. A request may carry duration_seconds, an integer from 1 to 600, which "improves usage reservation"; if you omit it Sume reserves 1 minute. The field is an estimate for the reservation, not a billing switch, and the hint tops out at 600 seconds.

How should I budget around a dated price?

Pick the cost line you can defend for your whole project: a promotional rate through one date, or a flat rate with no end date in its docs. For a long archive, run the numbers in cost to transcribe 1,000 hours. Price is only one input; this post does not compare accuracy or language coverage.