Plaud One AI Earbuds bring AI recording to your everyday workflow

Equipment

Plaud One AI Earbuds bring AI recording to your everyday workflow

By Tom MarshallSeptember 7, 202610 mins read

Plaud One combines wireless earbuds with AI-powered recording, transcription and workflow tools, offering a new way for creators to capture conversations, ideas and information on the go.

AI note-taking hardware has become an increasingly popular category, with companies finding new ways to move recording and transcription away from the smartphone. Plaud is taking that idea a step further with its latest device: a pair of wireless earbuds designed to capture conversations and connect them directly to AI tools.

The Plaud One can be used like a regular pair of earbuds for calls and music, but it can also record conversations through the earbuds or its charging case. From there, Plaud’s AI can transcribe, summarise and act on what has been captured.

What is the Plaud One?

At its core, Plaud One is an AI-powered recording device that happens to be built into wireless earbuds.

The earbuds can capture phone calls, online meetings, face-to-face conversations and ideas while you’re out and about. Meanwhile, the charging case can also be placed on a table to record an in-person conversation, and is capable of picking up voices from up to 5 metres away.

Each earbud has three microphones alongside a voice-processing unit, while the case has four microphones with AI beamforming. The earbuds have 16MB of local storage each (32MB total), while the case includes 512MB of storage.

The earbuds themselves feature 12mm dynamic drivers, adaptive active noise cancellation and transparency mode, so they’re designed to function as everyday wireless earbuds rather than simply being dedicated recording hardware. Plaud also supports LDAC for higher-resolution wireless audio.

The AI is where things get interesting

Recording a conversation isn’t particularly new. The more interesting part of Plaud One is what happens after you’ve finished recording.

Plaud Intelligence is designed to transcribe and understand the context of conversations, while Plaud Agent can use that information to carry out tasks. The Agent can connect with services including Gmail, Google Calendar, Notion and Slack. That means a conversation could potentially be turned into a follow-up email, calendar action, document, presentation or set of tasks without manually copying information between different apps.

Plaud also says its system can build context across conversations, rather than treating every recording as a completely separate note.

It doesn’t always need your phone

One of the Plaud One’s standout features is its built-in eSIM and 4G LTE connectivity.

The charging case can remain connected without relying on a nearby smartphone or Wi-Fi, allowing recordings to be uploaded and processed while you’re away from your other devices.

This is an important distinction from software-based AI note-taking tools, which generally require you to start with a phone, computer or another connected device.

TechCrunch notes that Plaud isn’t the first company to put AI recording into earbuds, with competitors including Anker and Viaim already exploring the form factor. Instead, Plaud is using its existing AI platform and connected services to differentiate its approach.

Could Plaud One be useful for musicians?

Plaud One isn’t specifically designed as a music-production device, so it shouldn’t be viewed as a replacement for a quality microphone or portable recorder.

There are, however, some practical applications for artists, producers, managers and labels.

A producer could use the earbuds or case to capture a discussion about changes to a track, while an artist could record songwriting ideas or conversations during a session. Managers and labels could potentially use it to keep track of decisions made during meetings and turn those discussions into follow-up tasks.

There’s also the simple benefit of capturing ideas wherever they happen.

Creative thoughts don’t always arrive when you’re sitting in front of a DAW or notebook. Having a recording device built into something you’re already wearing could make it easier to save a lyric idea, production thought or project note before it disappears.

The AI tools could then help organise that information afterwards.

Battery life and other specifications

Plaud claims up to six hours of continuous recording from the earbuds, while the charging case can provide up to 25 hours of continuous recording. Total earbud playback is rated at up to six hours with ANC switched off, or 4.5 hours with ANC on, with up to 36 hours available when combined with the case.

The earbuds use Bluetooth 5.4, support multipoint connectivity for two devices and include force-sensor controls. The case has dedicated buttons for recording and activating the AI Agent, while voice control is also supported.

That makes the hardware fairly versatile: you can use it as conventional earbuds, as a recording device, or as a hands-free way of interacting with Plaud’s AI.