Uni-voice

Inspiration

Communication should never be a barrier. Uni-voice was inspired by the everyday challenges faced by deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals during live conversations, lectures, and meetings. While many speech tools exist, few are designed with accessibility as the primary focus or provide a seamless, real-time experience. We wanted to build a simple yet powerful tool that promotes inclusive communication and gives users confidence in spoken environments.

What it does

Uni-voice is an accessibility-first web application that enables real-time voice-to-text and text-to-voice communication. It allows hearing-impaired users to instantly read spoken conversations and respond using synthesized voice output. Users can securely log in and access their transcription history, making the tool useful beyond one-time interactions.

How we built it

Uni-voice was built using a modern web stack with accessibility and performance in mind:

• Frontend: React with a clean, distraction-free interface and adjustable font sizes
• Speech Processing: Real-time speech-to-text and text-to-speech powered by AI models
• Authentication & Database: Supabase for secure user authentication and transcript storage
• Deployment: Hosted on Vercel for fast and reliable access

Supabase plays a core role by managing user sessions and storing user-specific transcripts with proper data isolation.

Challenges we ran into

• Handling real-time audio streams while keeping transcription latency low
  
• Managing partial and final transcription updates without cluttering the UI
  
• Designing an interface that remains readable and intuitive for different accessibility needs
  
• Balancing feature scope within the hackathon timeline
  

Accomplishments that we're proud of

• Building a fully functional real-time transcription system
  
• Creating an accessibility-focused UI with adjustable font scaling
  
• Securely storing user-specific transcription history
  
• Successfully integrating authentication and backend services in a short timeframe
  

What we learned

• Accessibility should be considered from the start, not added later
  
• Real-time applications require careful state and resource management
  
• Backend platforms like Supabase significantly speed up development without sacrificing best practices
  
• Small, well-designed features can have meaningful real-world impact
  

Built With

• gemini-api
• react
• supabase
• typescript
• vercel