Introduction
# Local STT (Parakeet / Whisper)
Unified local speech-to-text using ONNX Runtime with int8 quantization. Choose your backend:
- **Parakeet** (default): Best accuracy for English, correctly captures names and filler words - **Whisper**: Fastest inference, supports 99 languages
## Usage
```bash # Default: Parakeet v2 (best English accuracy) ~/.openclaw/skills/local-stt/scripts/local-stt.py audio.ogg
# Explicit backend selection ~/.openclaw/skills/local-stt/scripts/local-stt.py audio.ogg -b whisper ~/.openclaw/skills/local-stt/scripts/local-stt.py audio.ogg -b parakeet -m v3
# Quiet mode (suppress progress) ~/.openclaw/skills/local-stt/scripts/local-stt.py audio.ogg --quiet ```
## Options
- `-b/--backend`: `parakeet` (default), `whisper` - `-m/--model`: Model variant (see below) - `--no-int8`: Disable int8 quantization - `-q/--quiet`: Suppress progress - `--room-id`: Matrix room ID for direct message
## Models
### Parakeet (default backend) | Model | Description | |-------|-------------| | **v2** (default) | English only, best accuracy | | v3 | Multilingual |
### Whisper | Model | Description | |-------|-------------| | tiny | Fastest, lower accuracy | | **base** (default) | Good balance | | small | Better accuracy | | large-v3-turbo | Best quality, slower |
## Benchmark (24s audio)
| Backend/Model | Time | RTF | Notes | |---------------|------|-----|-------| | Whisper Base int8 | 0.43s | 0.018x | Fastest | | **Parakeet v2 int8** | 0.60s | 0.025x | Best accuracy | | Parakeet v3 int8 | 0.63s | 0.026x | Multilingual |
## openclaw.json
```json { "tools": { "media": { "audio": { "enabled": true, "models": [ { "type": "cli", "command": "~/.openclaw/skills/local-stt/scripts/local-stt.py", "args": ["--quiet", "{{MediaPath}}"], "timeoutSeconds": 30 } ] } } } } ```