---
title: "Speech recognition (ASR) — what it means · NoaLingua"
description: "Automatic speech recognition turns speech into text. What it can honestly tell you about your pronunciation, and what it cannot tell you at all."
url: "https://noalingua.com/glossary/asr/"
language: "en"
modified: "2026-08-21"
license: "CC BY 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
---
Glossary

# Speech recognition (ASR) — the NoaLingua glossary

Automatic speech recognition converts spoken audio into text.

For language learners it has two uses: transcribing material that has no subtitles, and checking whether what you said matches what you meant to say.

Both are less reliable than they appear. Recognition accuracy drops on accented speech — which is precisely what a learner produces — and on proper nouns, which is precisely what subtitles are most useful for. A low pronunciation score can mean the recogniser misheard rather than that you mispronounced.

In NoaLingua Say It Back writes out what it hears in real time and shows which words did not pass, so you can tell a mispronunciation from a misrecognition. It keeps the score and the missed words — never a recording of your voice.

## Where this shows up in NoaLingua

- [Pronunciation practice evidence and limits](https://noalingua.com/features/shadowing/)
- [How to improve pronunciation feedback](https://noalingua.com/blog/why-your-pronunciation-stops-improving/)

## Sources

Research and official documentation used for this definition.

- Research [The impact of non-native English speakers’ phonological and prosodic features on ASR accuracy](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167639324000104) Speech Communication, 2024 Why browser speech-recognition output can reflect recogniser limitations as well as a learner’s pronunciation.
- First-hand product evidence [Shadowing and pronunciation practice: product evidence and limits](https://noalingua.com/features/shadowing/) NoaLingua feature documentation Plain captures of the speaking turn and missed-word result, plus the boundary on what the score can mean.

## Related terms

[Shadowing Shadowing is repeating speech aloud immediately after hearing it, in the same rhythm and intonation as the speaker.](https://noalingua.com/glossary/shadowing/)[Text-to-speech (TTS) Text-to-speech is software that reads written text aloud in a synthetic voice.](https://noalingua.com/glossary/tts/)

## Try NoaLingua on the next video you were going to watch anyway.

Free, with every feature. No account, nothing to cancel, and your deck stays on your machine.

[Add to Chrome — Free Add to Chrome](https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/ocimolffhgpeeoifjpjhgikgfbnmlkdh) Opens the Chrome Web Store listing **NoaLingua — beyond dual subs: video, web, PDF** — free, no account, Chrome 138 or newer.

- [Free, and not a trial Every feature on the free plan — both PDF modes, shadowing, all 30 practice formats.](https://noalingua.com/pricing/)
- [No account, no email Nothing to sign up for and nothing to cancel. There is no login screen at all.](https://noalingua.com/privacy/)
- [Two dropdowns to set up Pick what you are learning and what you want translations in. That is the whole setup.](https://noalingua.com/getting-started/)
- [Your words stay yours Export to Anki, CSV, a spreadsheet or a full JSON profile — free on every plan.](https://noalingua.com/docs/export-import/)

[What happens after you install](https://noalingua.com/getting-started/) · [Pricing](https://noalingua.com/pricing/) · [What it cannot do](https://noalingua.com/limits/)