Turn your lecture notes into a revision podcast
Paste or upload your lecture notes and Lissin turns them into a revision episode that explains each topic and quizzes you. Handwritten notes work as a scanned PDF.
The short answer
Paste your notes into a new Lissin request, or upload them as a PDF or Word file on Plus or Pro, and say how to use them: "explain each topic from my notes, then quiz me". Handwritten notes work as a scanned PDF. Say whether it should stay inside your notes or fill gaps from the web.
How to do it
Get the notes into one file or one paste
Typed notes can be pasted straight into the request, up to 8,000 characters including your instructions, about 1,300 words. For more, export them as PDF or DOCX and upload on Plus or Pro. For handwritten pages, scan them into a PDF with your phone's document scanner, such as the one in the iPhone Notes app.
Say whether to stay inside your notes
Notes are fragments: abbreviations, arrows, half a definition. "Explain only what is in my notes and tell me where they are thin" keeps the episode to your course. "Fill the gaps from reliable sources" lets Lissin research the web as well, which helps with a missed lecture but can bring in material your course did not teach.
Ask for the revision shape
"Two hosts: one explains each topic in the order of the notes, the other asks the questions an examiner would" gives an episode you can play on the way to the exam. Ask it to end with five questions and the answers after a pause if you want to test yourself.
Make one episode per topic, not per term
A term of notes in one upload becomes a broad overview. One lecture or one topic per episode keeps it specific, and the episodes collect in one show you can replay before the exam.
At a glance
- Pasted notes
- Up to 8,000 characters including your instructions, on any plan
- Uploads
- PDF, DOCX, PPTX and more on Plus (3 files a week) and Pro (25 files a week). Not on Free
- Handwritten notes
- Upload them as a scanned PDF. Pages with no text layer are read by a vision model
- Episode length
- 5 to 25 minutes: up to 10 on Free, 15 on Plus and 25 on Pro
- What you get
- A spoken episode for one or two voices, with a transcript on paid plans
Hear what comes out
Shows already published on Lissin, free to play in the browser.
Questions
- Can it read my handwriting?
- Usually, if the scan is straight and well lit. Messy handwriting, diagrams and equations are read less reliably than printed text, so skim the transcript for misread terms before you revise from it.
- Will it add things that were not in my lectures?
- Only if you let it. Ask it to stay inside your notes and it works from them alone. Ask it to fill gaps and it researches the web, which may not match how your course teaches the topic.
- Can I do this on the free plan?
- Yes, by pasting the notes as text, within the free plan's 50 minutes of audio a week. Uploading files, including scanned handwritten notes, needs Plus or Pro.
- How is this different from turning a textbook chapter into audio?
- A textbook chapter is complete and edited. Your notes are shorthand, so the choice that matters is whether Lissin stays inside them or fills the gaps. For chapter-sized PDFs, see the textbook page.
What this does not do
Lissin works from what your notes say, so gaps and mistakes in them carry into the audio unless you ask it to research. Diagrams, equations and drawings in a scan are described in words, and they can be misread or lose their meaning when spoken. A generated explanation can be confidently wrong, so check anything you will be examined on against your course material. Creating an episode needs the iPhone app on iOS 26 or later.
Sources
Make your own show, or hear a sample
Make a show from your topic or documents in the Lissin iPhone app (iOS 26 or later). Or listen to public shows in the web player without installing the app.
Last reviewed October 27, 2026 by Lissin Editorial.