Picovoice Porcupine

by Picovoice

Don’t want to sign up for Picovoice Porcupine? Drop the file here.

The first 20 minutes of any recording are transcribed free: a recording up to 20 minutes transcribes in full, a longer one is previewed, and a pack from $6 (500 minutes) transcribes the rest and opens every export, and credits never expire.

On-device wake-word engine — runs on micro-controllers, mobile, browsers.

Linux, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Web, Edge  ·  Free tier · paid commercial · enterprise

TL;DR

Best for developers building on-device wake-word activation into apps, devices, and embedded products. Pricing: Free tier · paid commercial · enterprise.

Category
Products
License
Apache-2.0
Stars
★ 4.9k
Last push
2026-08-04
Pricing
Free tier · paid commercial · enterprise
Platforms
Linux, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Web, Edge

What it is

Porcupine is Picovoice's wake-word detector. Runs in <200 KB on ARM Cortex-M MCUs, scales up to mobile + desktop. Train custom wake words in the Picovoice Console.

Best for: Developers building on-device wake-word activation into apps, devices, and embedded products.
Watch out for: AccessKey required for non-FOSS use; on-device only — no cloud ASR; pricing tiers by commercial use.

Install / use

picovoice.ai — sign up + grab AccessKey · SDK in 8 languages

What people actually do with Picovoice Porcupine-style transcription

The tool is the means. These are the jobs — each one priced at published rates, each one wired up on its own page.

Wire it into Amazon S3n8nMake.comGoogle DriveZapierSlack

Features

Speaker diarizationNo
Word-level timestampsNo
Streaming / real-timeYes
Languages supported17
HIPAA eligibleNo

Links

GitHub repo ↗

Picovoice Porcupine vs Whipscribe

FeaturePicovoice PorcupineWhipscribe
CategoryProductsTranscription APIs
PricingNot verified$6–$24 one-time packs (credits never expire) · first 20 minutes free
Speaker identificationNot verifiedNamed in the summary, key quotes and chapters
Word timestampsNot verifiedYes
StreamingNot verifiedNo
Languages1799
PlatformsLinux, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Web, EdgeWeb, API, MCP

Alternatives to Picovoice Porcupine

Frequently asked about Picovoice Porcupine

How much does Picovoice Porcupine cost?

Picovoice Porcupine does not publish a self-serve price — it is quoted by the vendor on contact. Expect an enterprise-style agreement rather than a card-and-go signup.

Does Picovoice Porcupine work on Mac, Windows and Linux?

Picovoice Porcupine runs on Linux, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, Web and Edge.

How do I get started with Picovoice Porcupine?

There is nothing to install — Picovoice Porcupine is used in the browser. Create an account on the vendor's site and upload or connect your audio.

How many languages does Picovoice Porcupine support?

Picovoice Porcupine lists 17 languages.

What are the limitations of Picovoice Porcupine?

AccessKey required for non-FOSS use; on-device only — no cloud ASR; pricing tiers by commercial use.

Who is Picovoice Porcupine best for?

Developers building on-device wake-word activation into apps, devices, and embedded products.

Is Picovoice Porcupine open source?

No. Picovoice Porcupine is a proprietary product. If you need source you can read and run yourself, the open-source tools in this directory are the place to look.

Where is the Picovoice Porcupine source code?

On GitHub at github.com/Picovoice/porcupine.

What kind of tool is Picovoice Porcupine?

In this directory Picovoice Porcupine is filed under wake word, edge, sdk as a product.

What are the alternatives to Picovoice Porcupine?

There is a side-by-side page at /tools/picovoice-porcupine-alternatives comparing Picovoice Porcupine with the closest tools in the same category on price, platform and features.

Can I automate Picovoice Porcupine-style transcription without running it myself?

Yes. If what you want is transcripts rather than the tool itself, Whipscribe does the same job as a hosted API: submit a file or URL, poll a job id, pull the result as txt, json, srt, vtt or docx. $0.012 a minute — about $0.72 an audio hour — bought as credits that never expire. The automation recipes on this site show it wired to Drive folders, Zoom recordings, S3 buckets and no-code platforms.

How is Whipscribe different from Picovoice Porcupine?

Picovoice Porcupine is another vendor's product; Whipscribe is a per-minute transcription service. Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and never used for training, and every job returns five formats plus an AI summary, quotes and topics. The first 20 minutes of any recording are transcribed free, and a pack from $6 (500 minutes) transcribes the rest and opens every export.

What does transcription cost if I use Whipscribe instead of Picovoice Porcupine?

$0.012 a minute — about $0.72 an audio hour — bought as credits that never expire. There is no subscription and no monthly minimum: a 3-hour recording is about $2.16, a thousand-hour archive is about $720 once. The first 20 minutes of any recording are transcribed free, and a pack from $6 (500 minutes) transcribes the rest and opens every export, so you can see what your recording holds before paying anything.

Where is the Picovoice Porcupine category heading?

Three things are moving across the whole speech-to-text market right now: summaries, action items and speaker insights generated on top of the transcript rather than sold separately; private, secured deployment where the audio never leaves a boundary you control; and agent access — transcription exposed as a tool that Claude, Cursor or a workflow runner can call directly. Whipscribe ships all three today: per-job insights, our own servers, and an MCP server.

Whipscribe is a hosted transcription 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.

Transcribe your recordings

Explore

Long recording to get through?

One file up to 10 hours, as an upload or a link: see transcribing a long MP3 or M4A, a podcast episode as text from its link and the SRT file generator.

Comparing tools before you pay?

If you would rather pay a service than run software yourself: see how the best transcription services compare, affordable transcription priced per hour and how our transcription services work.