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Overview

WhisperSTTService provides offline speech recognition using OpenAI’s Whisper models running locally. Supports multiple model sizes and hardware acceleration options including CPU, CUDA, and Apple Silicon (MLX) for privacy-focused transcription without external API calls.

Whisper STT API Reference

Pipecat’s API methods for Whisper STT integration

Standard Whisper Example

Complete example with standard Whisper

Whisper Documentation

OpenAI’s Whisper research paper and model details

MLX Whisper Example

Apple Silicon optimized example

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Installation

Choose your installation based on your hardware:

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Standard Whisper (CPU/CUDA)

pip install "pipecat-ai[whisper]"

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MLX Whisper (Apple Silicon)

pip install "pipecat-ai[mlx-whisper]"

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Prerequisites

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Local Model Setup

Before using Whisper STT services, you need:
  1. Model Selection: Choose appropriate Whisper model size (tiny, base, small, medium, large)
  2. Hardware Configuration: Set up CPU, CUDA, or Apple Silicon acceleration
  3. Storage Space: Ensure sufficient disk space for model downloads

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Configuration Options

  • Model Size: Balance between accuracy and performance based on your hardware
  • Hardware Acceleration: Configure CUDA for NVIDIA GPUs or MLX for Apple Silicon
  • Language Support: Whisper supports 99+ languages out of the box
No API keys required - Whisper runs entirely locally for complete privacy.