Ultrafield vs Gladia.
Considering Ultrafield as a Gladia alternative? A like-for-like read on published rates and packaging — including why their committed-volume tier closes most of the gap. List pricing, verified August 2026.
Published rates, per hour of audio.
Bundled rate or metered stages.
Against Gladia's pay-as-you-go Starter rates the comparison is lopsided: $0.61 per hour async and $0.75 real-time, against $0.07 to $0.19 here. But quoting only that would be misleading, because almost nobody at volume pays Starter.
Their committed tier is the real comparison
Gladia's Growth tier reaches roughly $0.20 per hour async, with speaker diarization and language detection included in that number. Our ASR-1 plus a diarization stage is $0.19. That is near parity, not a gulf — and it is the number worth arguing about.
Which packaging wins depends on your mix
A bundled rate is a bet that most requests use most features. If you diarize every recording, that bet pays and their packaging is simpler to forecast. If you diarize a fraction — plenty of teams transcribe everything and separate speakers only for multi-party calls — then paying $0.07 per hour on transcription-only requests and adding $0.06 only where it is needed is materially cheaper than a blended rate.
No commitment to get our rates
Ours are pay-as-you-go with one-time top-ups and no subscription. Their lowest rates require the committed Growth tier. Compare like for like: their Starter against ours, or their Growth against ours plus whatever volume terms we agree.
When they are the better choice.
Speaker separation and language detection are included in their base rate rather than metered as stages. For diarize-everything workloads that simplifies the bill.
Their Growth tier reaches roughly $0.20/hr async all-in. Against our ASR-1 plus diarization at $0.19 that is near parity, not a gulf.
No per-stage arithmetic. If you want a single number to put in a spreadsheet, their packaging is simpler than ours.
European vendor with broad multilingual support and code-switching, which matters for some data-residency and language requirements.
Moving over, without a rewrite.
Our audio endpoints follow OpenAI conventions for routes, Bearer auth, errors and usage reporting.
Whisper large-v3-turbo for lowest cost, ASR-1 where accuracy on difficult audio matters more.
What Gladia includes, we meter: add diarization only on the requests that need it, and pay nothing for it on the ones that do not.
If you diarize everything, their bundle competes. If you diarize a fraction, per-stage metering wins.
Questions people actually ask.
Is Ultrafield a good Gladia alternative?
On pay-as-you-go rates, clearly — batch is $0.07 to $0.13 per hour against their Starter rate of $0.61, and real-time is $0.11 to $0.19 against $0.75. The picture is closer at their committed Growth tier, which reaches roughly $0.20 per hour async with diarization included. Whether we win there depends on how much of your traffic actually needs diarization.
How much cheaper is Ultrafield than Gladia?
Against Gladia Starter, batch is about 79% less and real-time about 75% less. Against their Growth tier at roughly $0.20 per hour all-in, our ASR-1 plus diarization at $0.19 is near parity, and Whisper large-v3-turbo plus diarization at $0.13 is about a third less.
Gladia includes diarization. Does that make them cheaper?
It can, and it depends entirely on your mix. If every request needs speaker separation, a bundled rate is simple and competitive. If only some do, per-stage metering means you pay $0.07 per hour on the requests that are transcription-only rather than a blended rate that assumes diarization on all of them.
Do I need a volume commitment to get your rates?
No. The rates on our pricing page are pay-as-you-go with one-time top-ups and no subscription. Gladia’s lowest rates require their committed Growth tier, so compare like for like: their Starter rate against ours, or their Growth rate against ours plus whatever volume terms we agree.
What do I gain by switching?
Open-weight models you can name explicitly rather than a single proprietary stack, per-stage metering so unused capabilities cost nothing, and speaker identification and language-model processing on the same job as transcription.
When should I stay on Gladia?
If you diarize every request and are already on their committed tier, the economics are close enough that migration probably is not worth it. Their bundled packaging is also genuinely simpler to forecast, and if you need an EU-based vendor specifically that may settle it.
Price it against your own mix.
Bundled or metered comes down to how much of your traffic actually needs diarization. Tell us the split and we will do the arithmetic honestly.
Rates verified august 2026 from published list pricing