setup
audio recording is enabled by default in the desktop app. configure audio devices and transcription engine in settings.- audio devices: select which microphones and system audio to capture
- transcription engine: choose between local Whisper (private) or Deepgram (faster, cloud)
search transcriptions
speaker identification
screenpipe automatically identifies different speakers. manage them via API:tips
- use a good microphone
- reduce background noise
whisper-large-v3-turbogives best accuracy- set language to English in settings if you only speak English (faster)
long meetings and batch sizing
by default, screenpipe batches audio for transcription in chunks:- Whisper/OpenAI: 600 seconds (10 minutes)
- Deepgram: up to 5000 seconds (83 minutes)
batch_max_duration_secs. set to your meeting’s typical duration to preserve context across the entire recording.
in smart/batch transcription mode, large meetings may be split across multiple transcription jobs. if you need full meeting context in a single batch, consider:
- switching to realtime transcription (transcription happens immediately as audio is captured, trading cost/latency for guaranteed continuity)
- increasing
batch_max_duration_secsto match your meeting length (supported up to engine limits: 5000s for Deepgram, 3000s for OpenAI) - using retranscription API to re-process a full meeting with custom settings
privacy
- all transcription runs locally on your device
- audio files stored in
~/.screenpipe/data/ - no audio sent to cloud unless you choose deepgram
- disable audio recording in app settings