---
title: transcribe
description: API Reference for transcribe.
---

# `transcribe()`

<Note type="warning">`transcribe` is an experimental feature.</Note>

Generates a transcript from an audio file.

```ts
import { experimental_transcribe as transcribe } from 'ai';
import { openai } from '@ai-sdk/openai';
import { readFile } from 'fs/promises';

const { text: transcript } = await transcribe({
  model: openai.transcription('whisper-1'),
  audio: await readFile('audio.mp3'),
});

console.log(transcript);
```

## Import

<Snippet
  text={`import { experimental_transcribe as transcribe } from "ai"`}
  prompt={false}
/>

## API Signature

### Parameters

<PropertiesTable
  content={[
    {
      name: 'model',
      type: 'TranscriptionModelV3',
      description: 'The transcription model to use.',
    },
    {
      name: 'audio',
      type: 'DataContent (string | Uint8Array | ArrayBuffer | Buffer) | URL',
      description: 'The audio file to generate the transcript from.',
    },
    {
      name: 'providerOptions',
      type: 'Record<string, JSONObject>',
      isOptional: true,
      description: 'Additional provider-specific options.',
    },
    {
      name: 'maxRetries',
      type: 'number',
      isOptional: true,
      description: 'Maximum number of retries. Default: 2.',
    },
    {
      name: 'abortSignal',
      type: 'AbortSignal',
      isOptional: true,
      description: 'An optional abort signal to cancel the call.',
    },
    {
      name: 'headers',
      type: 'Record<string, string>',
      isOptional: true,
      description: 'Additional HTTP headers for the request.',
    },
    {
      name: 'download',
      type: '(options: { url: URL; abortSignal?: AbortSignal }) => Promise<{ data: Uint8Array; mediaType: string | undefined }>',
      isOptional: true,
      description:
        'Custom download function for fetching audio from URLs. Use `createDownload()` from `ai` to create a download function with custom size limits, e.g. `createDownload({ maxBytes: 50 * 1024 * 1024 })`. Default: built-in download with 2 GiB limit.',
    },
  ]}
/>

### Returns

<PropertiesTable
  content={[
    {
      name: 'text',
      type: 'string',
      description: 'The complete transcribed text from the audio input.',
    },
    {
      name: 'segments',
      type: 'Array<{ text: string; startSecond: number; endSecond: number }>',
      description:
        'An array of transcript segments, each containing a portion of the transcribed text along with its start and end times in seconds.',
    },
    {
      name: 'language',
      type: 'string | undefined',
      description:
        'The language of the transcript in ISO-639-1 format e.g. "en" for English.',
    },
    {
      name: 'durationInSeconds',
      type: 'number | undefined',
      description: 'The duration of the transcript in seconds.',
    },
    {
      name: 'warnings',
      type: 'Warning[]',
      description:
        'Warnings from the model provider (e.g. unsupported settings).',
    },
    {
      name: 'providerMetadata',
      type: 'Record<string, JSONObject>',
      isOptional: true,
      description:
        'Optional metadata from the provider. The outer key is the provider name. The inner values are the metadata. Details depend on the provider.',
    },
    {
      name: 'responses',
      type: 'Array<TranscriptionModelResponseMetadata>',
      description:
        'Response metadata from the provider. There may be multiple responses if we made multiple calls to the model.',
      properties: [
        {
          type: 'TranscriptionModelResponseMetadata',
          parameters: [
            {
              name: 'timestamp',
              type: 'Date',
              description: 'Timestamp for the start of the generated response.',
            },
            {
              name: 'modelId',
              type: 'string',
              description:
                'The ID of the response model that was used to generate the response.',
            },
            {
              name: 'headers',
              type: 'Record<string, string>',
              isOptional: true,
              description: 'Response headers.',
            },
          ],
        },
      ],
    },
  ]}
/>