Picovoice Cobra
by Picovoice
On-device voice-activity detector — detect speech vs silence in real time.
TL;DR
On-device voice-activity detector — detect speech vs silence in real time.
Best for apps that need a VAD to gate downstream ASR or to trigger recording. Pricing: Free tier · paid commercial.
Category
Products
License
—
Stars
—
Last push
—
Pricing
Free tier · paid commercial
Platforms
Linux, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Web, Edge
What it is
Cobra is Picovoice's voice-activity-detection engine. Smaller footprint and more robust than Silero / WebRTC VAD on noisy edge hardware.
Best for: Apps that need a VAD to gate downstream ASR or to trigger recording.
Watch out for: VAD only — does not transcribe; pair with Cheetah or Leopard for text output.
Watch out for: VAD only — does not transcribe; pair with Cheetah or Leopard for text output.
Install / use
picovoice.ai/platform/cobra — SDKs across 8 languagesFeatures
| Speaker diarization | No |
| Word-level timestamps | No |
| Streaming / real-time | Yes |
| Languages supported | 1 |
| HIPAA eligible | No |
Picovoice Cobra vs Whipscribe
| Feature | Picovoice Cobra | Whipscribe |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Products | Transcription APIs |
| Pricing | Free tier · paid commercial | free beta |
| Speaker diarization | — | Yes |
| Word timestamps | — | Yes |
| Streaming | Yes | No |
| Languages | 1 | 99 |
| Platforms | Linux, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Web, Edge | Web, API, MCP |
Alternatives to Picovoice Cobra
Whipscribe is a managed faster-whisper + whisperX service. If you want transcripts without running infrastructure, paste a URL or drop a file in the form below — you'll have a transcript in seconds.