Aural

Overview

Aural is a platform for structured interviews that can follow a participant’s answers rather than stick to a fixed script. It is best suited to teams that want adaptive interviews and structured outputs, with the option to self-host. Its low entry price is appealing, but the free plan’s small quotas and the API’s missing integration tools narrow its fit.

Key features

Aural’s AI interviewer adjusts follow-up depth, tone, and direction in response to participant answers. That makes it a strong fit for exploratory conversations where a rigid question sequence would miss useful detail; teams seeking tightly standardized exchanges may prefer more control over the interview flow.

Interviews can run live or asynchronously through chat, voice, or video, and sessions can be recorded. Templates and five question formats—open-ended, multiple-choice, rating scale, coding, and whiteboard—support varied interview designs. Aural supports English, Chinese, Spanish, French, German, and other languages.

Automatic transcription and summaries reduce the work of reviewing sessions, while XLSX and PDF exports provide structured outputs for further use. The REST API uses Bearer-token authentication and has an OpenAPI specification. However, there are no webhooks or official SDKs, and internal tRPC and voice WebSockets are not stable Developer API contracts. That makes the API less suitable for workflows that depend on event-driven integrations or supported client libraries.

Aural is open source under the MIT license and can be self-hosted, with pluggable LLMs including OpenAI, Kimi, MiniMax, or compatible APIs. That flexibility will appeal to teams that want infrastructure and model choice; hosted users may value simplicity more. Aural states that data is encrypted at rest with AES-256 and in transit with TLS 1.3, and that it complies with GDPR and other global privacy regulations. General and technical support are handled by email.

Pricing

The Free plan costs $0/month and includes 3 templates, 100 AI tokens, 30 minutes of session time, and 1 seat. It gives a solo user room to assess the workflow, but the session and token caps limit sustained use.

Pay As You Go charges $0.08 per minute of session time and $0.02 per AI token, with additional seats at $10/seat/month. This avoids a fixed subscription for occasional use, but variable session and token charges make costs depend on activity.

Starter costs $9/month for 10 templates, 200 AI tokens, 3 hours of session time, 1 seat, and email support. It suits an individual with modest recurring needs. Basic costs $24/month and raises the allowance to 500 AI tokens and 10 hours of session time, while keeping 10 templates, 1 seat, and email support; it is the better fit for a solo user running more interviews, not a larger team. Both subscriptions remain limited to one seat.

Platforms

Aural supports Android, iOS, web, API, and self-hosted use. The self-hosting option is the distinctive choice for teams that want to run the open-source software on their own infrastructure.

Who it's for

Aural suits researchers, interviewers, and teams collecting structured responses through adaptable conversations, especially when automated transcripts, summaries, and exports are useful. It is less compelling for multi-seat teams on the listed hosted plans or for developers who need webhooks and official SDKs.

Pros and cons

Pros: Adaptive follow-ups support more responsive interviews; multiple formats and question types cover varied collection methods; automatic transcripts, summaries, and XLSX/PDF exports turn sessions into usable outputs; MIT licensing, self-hosting, and pluggable LLMs offer control over deployment and model choice.

Cons: Free usage is capped at 30 minutes and 100 AI tokens; Starter and Basic include only one seat; the API lacks webhooks and official SDKs, limiting integration options.

Alternatives

Video Interviewing Software is the broader category to compare when you want to survey options beyond Aural.

Hyring is worth considering for hiring workflows: its free plan includes 50 credits per month, one seat, one active job post, English-only interviews, and one AI voice, while its Pro plan is $79/month.

Willo is a paid alternative with broad desktop and mobile platform support; its Lite plan costs £49 per live role and charges only for roles used each month, with no contract.

Interviewer.AI is another paid option, with a free trial and an Essential Edition at $199/month that includes 50 interview credits per month, 3 job posts per month, 20 minutes per interview, and 15 total user licenses.

interviewstream is another paid interview platform to compare.

Jobma is another paid option to consider.

One Way Interview is a paid alternative with a free trial.

Talview offers tailored, unit-based pricing and typically requires a minimum commitment of approximately 150 to 200 candidates; consider it when that pricing structure suits your volume.

EasyHire.me has a free plan and paid, per-job monthly plans, including an entry plan at $49/month for 10 interviews monthly, 3 team members, and one month of interview storage.

Verdict

Choose Aural if you want adaptive, multimodal interviews with automatic structured outputs and value the option to self-host or select an LLM. Look elsewhere if your team needs more than one hosted seat at the entry tiers or depends on API webhooks and official SDKs.