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faster-whisper
faster-whisper is a transcription library that runs OpenAI's Whisper model faster using CTranslate2.
Faster-whisper is a reimplementation of OpenAI's Whisper model using CTranslate2, a fast inference engine for Transformer models. It is designed for developers and users who need efficient speech-to-text transcription. The library achieves up to 4 times faster execution than openai/whisper while maintaining accuracy and using less memory. It decodes audio using the PyAV library, removing the need for a separate FFmpeg installation. It also integrates the Silero VAD model to filter out non-speech audio segments and supports word-level timestamps and batched transcription.
faster-whisper at a glance
- Best for: Software engineer
- Runs on: Linux, Windows, macOS, self-hosted, open source
- Pricing: Free
- Released: February 2023
- Category: AI audio tool
- Website: github.com/SYSTRAN/faster-whisper
Key features
- Transcribes audio using CTranslate2
- Supports 8-bit quantization on CPU and GPU
- Integrates Silero VAD model for silence removal
- Provides word-level timestamps
- Supports batched transcription
- Decodes audio via PyAV library
Use it for
- Transcribing audio files to text
- Filtering out non-speech parts of audio
- Generating word-level timestamps
- Running batched speech recognition
Alternatives to faster-whisper
- WhisperX — It enables 70x faster, batched transcription with high-accuracy alignment.
- WhisperLive — It provides real-time speech-to-text using multiple backends like Faster Whisper and TensorRT.
- whisper.cpp — It provides high-performance, offline speech recognition on diverse hardware.
- Whisper Timestamped — Generates accurate word-level timestamps without extra neural networks.
- Whisper ASR Webservice — Provides a REST API for multiple ASR engines including WhisperX and Faster Whisper.
- browser-whisper — Transcribes audio and video locally with zero servers involved.
- Whisper Diarization — Combines OpenAI Whisper with voice activity detection and speaker embedding.
- WhisperLiveKit — It delivers ultra-low-latency streaming audio processing with multiple advanced backends.
- SpeechFast — Dictate anywhere on Mac with 100 percent local processing and no cloud servers.
- Speech-to-Speech — Fully modular, swappable components with local or hosted execution options.
- AssemblyAI — Industry-leading speech models deliver high accuracy and low latency for voice applications.
- Piper — Runs locally and offers fast neural text-to-speech synthesis.
All faster-whisper alternatives