#Transcription

Convert speech to text using Apple's on-device SpeechAnalyzer and SpeechTranscriber.

#Overview

This provider uses Apple's SpeechAnalyzer and SpeechTranscriber to perform speech-to-text transcription entirely on-device. This is Apple's new advanced speech recognition model and is available in iOS 26 and onwards.

#Requirements

• iOS 26+ - SpeechAnalyzer requires iOS 26

#Usage

#Basic Transcription

const file = await fetch(
  'https://www.voiptroubleshooter.com/open_speech/american/OSR_us_000_0010_8k.wav'
)
const audio = await file.arrayBuffer()

const response = await experimental_transcribe({
  model: apple.transcriptionModel(),
  audio,
})

console.log(response.text)
console.log(response.segments)
console.log(response.durationInSeconds)

The audio parameter accepts either an ArrayBuffer or a base64-encoded string.

#Language Support

The transcription model supports multiple languages with automatic language detection. You can configure a custom language when creating the model:

const model = apple.transcriptionModel({ language: 'fr' })

await experimental_transcribe({
  model,
  audio: audioArrayBuffer,
})

#Preparing the Model

Apple's SpeechAnalyzer requires downloading language-specific assets to the device. While the provider automatically prepares assets when needed, you can call prepare() ahead of time for better performance:

const model = apple.transcriptionModel({ language: 'en' })

// Call prepare() ahead of time to optimize first inference latency
await model.prepare()

// Now transcription will be faster on first use
const response = await experimental_transcribe({ model, audio })

When you call prepare(), the system first checks if the required assets are already present on the device. If they are, the method resolves immediately without any network activity.

#Direct API Access

For advanced use cases, you can access the speech transcription API directly:

#AppleTranscription

import { AppleTranscription } from '@react-native-ai/apple'

// Check availability for a language
const isAvailable: boolean = await AppleTranscription.isAvailable(language: string)

// Prepare language assets
await AppleTranscription.prepare(language: string)

// Transcribe audio with timing information
const { segments, duration } = await AppleTranscription.transcribe(
  arrayBuffer,
  language: string
)

#Benchmarks

Performance comparison showing transcription speed for a 34-minute audio file (source):

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