Models

Every model HyperWhisper offers — speech-to-text and post-processing, on-device and cloud — and why each one exists. Pick by privacy, language coverage, speed, accuracy, and cost.

HyperWhisper doesn’t lock you into one engine. It ships a library of models because no single model wins on everything — each trades off privacy, language coverage, speed, accuracy, and cost differently. This page lists everything on offer and explains why each one is there.

There are two kinds of model:

• Speech-to-text — turns your voice into text (the transcription step).
• Post-processing — an optional LLM pass that cleans up, punctuates, and formats the transcript afterwards.

You choose both in the app under Model Library, and per-mode in the mode editor.

Three ways to run a model

Every model — speech or post-processing — falls into one of three buckets:

On-device

Runs entirely on your machine. Audio never leaves your device, works offline, and costs nothing per minute. The strongest privacy guarantee.

HyperWhisper Cloud

Built-in, no API key, no separate account. The most accurate option, billed per minute of actual speech with no markup.

Bring your own key

Plug in your own provider API key and pay that provider directly — useful if you already have credits or want a specific model.

There is no universally “best” model. On-device models are unbeatable for privacy and offline use; cloud models are noticeably more accurate on accents, noise, and technical vocabulary. The library exists so you can make that trade yourself.

Speech-to-text models

On-device

These run locally with no network calls. Once downloaded (where applicable) they work fully offline — your audio is never uploaded anywhere. See Data Privacy for details.

Model	Runs on	Languages	Why it’s here
Apple Speech	macOS (built-in)	Auto-detect	Zero download, instant, private. The fastest way to start dictating on a Mac with nothing to install.
NVIDIA Parakeet	macOS · Windows	English (V2) · 25 European (V3)	Fastest accurate on-device transcription for English and European languages.
NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5	macOS	6 Latin · ~40 incl. Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic	Best on-device accuracy and the broadest offline language coverage — the only local option that reaches beyond European languages.
Whisper	macOS · Windows	100 languages	OpenAI’s general-purpose model in many sizes (Tiny → Large). The universal fallback: runs on almost any hardware, including CPU-only and older machines.
Qwen3 ASR	macOS	Multilingual	An additional multilingual on-device option for users who want to try Alibaba’s ASR model.

Whisper models

OpenAI’s general-purpose multilingual models. The VRAM values are the recommended GPU memory for full acceleration — with less, the model still runs on CPU (or partial GPU), just slower.

Model	Size	Recommended VRAM	Languages	Best for
Tiny	~69 MB (macOS) / ~78 MB (Windows)	~1 GB	Multilingual	Lowest-end machines, quick drafts
Tiny (English)	~69 MB (macOS) / ~78 MB (Windows)	~1 GB	English only	Same as Tiny, slightly better English
Base	148 MB	~1 GB	Multilingual	Light hardware, basic dictation
Base (English)	148 MB	~1 GB	English only	Same as Base, slightly better English
Small	488 MB	~2 GB	Multilingual	Best balance for most users
Small (English)	488 MB	~2 GB	English only	Same as Small, slightly better English
Medium	1.5 GB	~5 GB	Multilingual	Higher accuracy, mid-range GPUs
Medium (English)	1.5 GB	~5 GB	English only	Same as Medium, slightly better English
Large v3 Turbo	1.5 GB	~6 GB	Multilingual	Near-Large accuracy, much faster
Large v2	3.1 GB	~10 GB	Multilingual	Highest Whisper accuracy (older)
Large v3	3.1 GB	~10 GB	Multilingual	Highest Whisper accuracy (latest)

English-only variants (.en) use the same architecture trained only on English data. If you only ever dictate in English, they’re slightly more accurate at the same size — but you lose multilingual support entirely.

NVIDIA Parakeet models

NVIDIA Parakeet models are typically faster than equivalent-size Whisper models and very accurate for the languages they support.

Model	Size	Languages	Best for
Parakeet V2 (English)	474 MB	English only	Fastest accurate English transcription
Parakeet V3 (Multilingual)	494 MB	25 European languages	Multilingual European dictation

Parakeet V3 covers: English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Czech, Slovak, Hungarian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Croatian, Slovenian, Serbian, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian.

On Windows, Parakeet runs on both x64 and ARM64, while Whisper is currently x64-only. If you’re on a Snapdragon / ARM Windows device, choose Parakeet.

NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 models

NVIDIA’s Nemotron 3.5 ASR is the newest on-device option (macOS). It edges out the other local models on accuracy and reaches well beyond European languages — the multilingual variant is the only local model that handles Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Arabic.

Model	Size	Languages	Best for
Nemotron 3.5 (Latin)	~350 MB	English, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, German	Smaller, faster Latin-script transcription
Nemotron 3.5 (Multilingual)	~1.3 GB	~40 languages incl. Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic	Broadest offline language coverage

Want non-European languages offline? Nemotron 3.5 (Multilingual) is the pick. Choose the Latin variant if you only speak English/Spanish/French/Italian/Portuguese/German and want it smaller and faster.

Apple Speech & Qwen3 ASR

• Apple Speech is built into macOS — no download, available the moment you launch the app. It’s the quickest private option for everyday Mac dictation. (Requires a recent macOS version.)
• Qwen3 ASR is an additional multilingual on-device model (macOS) for users who want to try Alibaba’s ASR.

Offline language coverage at a glance

Not sure which local model handles your language? This table maps the common use-cases. For the full Parakeet V3 and Nemotron language lists, see the sections above.

Language / region	Best offline option	Also works
English	Parakeet V2 or V3, Nemotron Latin	Whisper (any size)
Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, German	Nemotron Latin, Parakeet V3	Whisper
Other European (Polish, Czech, Dutch, etc.)	Parakeet V3	Whisper
Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic	Nemotron Multilingual	Whisper Large
100-language general coverage	Whisper Large v3	—
macOS, fastest start, no download	Apple Speech	—

Nemotron is macOS-only. Parakeet and Whisper run on both macOS and Windows. See individual sections above for details.

HyperWhisper Cloud

HyperWhisper Cloud is built-in — no API key, no separate account. It routes to best-in-class providers behind four accuracy tiers, and you only pay for actual speech (silence and empty recordings cost 0 credits). Use it when you want the highest accuracy without any setup.

Tier	Powered by	Best for
Highest	ElevenLabs Scribe v2	Accents, noisy audio, technical vocabulary
High	Grok STT (xAI)	Solid multilingual accuracy at low cost
Medium	Deepgram Nova-3	Strong English accuracy, low latency
Fast	Groq Whisper Large v3	Sub-second latency for English & major European languages

See Providers for pricing, cost examples, and per-language guidance.

Bring your own key

If you already hold API credits, want a provider’s free tier (Deepgram $200, AssemblyAI $50), or need a specific model, plug in your own key under API Keys. You pay the provider directly at their published rate.

Supported providers for bring-your-own-key transcription:

OpenAI · Groq · Deepgram · AssemblyAI · ElevenLabs · Mistral · Soniox · Google Gemini

When you bring your own key, opting your audio out of model training is your responsibility — each provider has its own setting. See Data Privacy for a copy-pasteable prompt that finds the current opt-out for any provider.

Post-processing models

Post-processing is an optional second step: after transcription, an LLM cleans up filler words, fixes punctuation and capitalization, and applies any formatting your mode asks for. It’s separate from the speech model — you can mix any speech model with any post-processing model.

Cloud post-processing

Available built-in through HyperWhisper Cloud (no key needed) or with your own API key.

Provider	Bring-your-own-key needed?	Character
HyperWhisper Cloud	No	Built-in, credit-based
OpenAI	Yes	GPT-4.1 and GPT-5 family; fast and accurate
Anthropic (Claude)	Yes	Claude Haiku and Sonnet; high quality reasoning
Google Gemini	Yes	Gemini Flash and Pro; efficient, multilingual
Groq	Yes	Ultra-fast inference via GPT OSS and Llama 4 models
xAI (Grok)	Yes	Grok 4.3; high-accuracy with low latency
Cerebras	Yes	Ultra-fast inference; GPT OSS, Qwen, and Z.ai models
Mistral	Yes	Multilingual-friendly; Mistral Small and Nemo

Every cloud post-processing model is labeled with a speed and accuracy rating (explained in the Rating scale section below) so you can pick the trade-off that matters to you.

Local LLM post-processing

Local Gemma 4 models clean up and format transcript text fully offline after download — your text never leaves your device. The local LLM is powered by a bundled llama.cpp server that starts automatically when the mode needs it.

Platform availability:

macOS

Local LLM post-processing is available on Apple Silicon Macs (M1 and later). The llama.cpp server runs via Metal GPU acceleration. Intel Macs do not support local LLM post-processing — cloud post-processing providers are available as an alternative.

Model	Size	Recommended RAM	Best for
Gemma 4 E2B (Recommended)	3.1 GB	~4 GB	Best balance of speed and quality for most Macs
Gemma 4 E4B	5 GB	~6 GB	Higher quality cleanup
Gemma 4 12B	7.1 GB	~10 GB	Mid-size dense model, good for 16 GB Macs
Gemma 4 26B MoE	16.9 GB	~18 GB	Mixture-of-experts for capable machines
Gemma 4 31B Dense	18.3 GB	~20 GB	Highest local quality, slowest

Windows

Local LLM post-processing is available on Windows x64 and ARM64. GPU acceleration uses NVIDIA CUDA when a compatible GPU is detected on x64; ARM64 and non-CUDA configurations fall back to CPU.

Model	Size	Recommended VRAM	Best for
Gemma 4 E2B (Recommended)	3.1 GB	~4 GB	Recommended local cleanup model
Gemma 4 E4B	5 GB	~6 GB	Higher quality local cleanup
Gemma 4 26B MoE	16.9 GB	~18 GB	High-memory workstations
Gemma 4 31B Dense	18.3 GB	~20 GB	Highest local quality, slowest

On AMD and Intel GPUs, local Gemma post-processing uses CPU fallback in the current Windows build. Transcription can still use GPU acceleration independently.

Rating scale

Every model in the library — speech-to-text and post-processing — shows a Speed bar and an Accuracy bar, each rated 1–5. The numbers come from an internal benchmark suite run over real recordings (results in benchmarks/results/).

Rating	Speed (p50 latency)	Transcription accuracy (avg WER)	Post-processing accuracy (WER vs reference)
5	< 700 ms	< 5%	< 8%
4	700 ms – 2 s	5 – 8%	8 – 15%
3	2 – 3.5 s	8 – 12%	15 – 25%
2	3.5 – 5.5 s	12 – 18%	25 – 40%
1	> 5.5 s	> 18%	> 40%

The Model Library sorts by the sum of Speed + Accuracy (descending) so the most balanced models float to the top. If you care more about one dimension than the other, you can scroll past the top recommendations to find a model that emphasizes speed or quality specifically.

A model with Speed 5, Accuracy 3 and one with Speed 3, Accuracy 5 land at the same rank. Look at the individual bars, not just the position in the list, when you have a strong preference.

Using on-device models

Downloading & storage

Open Model Library in the app, click Download on any entry, and watch the circular progress indicator. You can cancel mid-stream with the × button. Downloaded models stay on disk until you remove them.

Platform	Storage location
Windows	%LOCALAPPDATA%\HyperWhisper\Models\
macOS	~/Library/Application Support/hyperwhisper/models/

Apple Speech is built into macOS and needs no download.

GPU vs CPU

Local engines use your GPU when available and fall back to CPU automatically if you don’t have a dedicated GPU or there isn’t enough VRAM. The model still runs on CPU — it’s just slower.

Engine	Backend	GPU support	CPU fallback
Whisper (Windows)	WhisperNet / DirectCompute	NVIDIA, AMD, Intel (any DirectX 11 GPU)	Yes
Whisper (macOS)	libwhisper / Metal	Apple Silicon GPU + Neural Engine	Yes
Parakeet (Windows)	sherpa-onnx / DirectML	NVIDIA, AMD, Intel	Yes
Parakeet (macOS)	sherpa-onnx / CoreML	Apple Silicon	Yes
Nemotron (macOS)	FluidAudio / CoreML	Apple Silicon	Yes
Local Gemma post-processing (macOS)	llama.cpp / Metal	Apple Silicon (M1+)	No (Intel Macs not supported)
Local Gemma post-processing (Windows)	LLamaSharp / GGUF	NVIDIA CUDA (x64 only)	Yes (CPU — x64 and ARM64)

Removing models

To free up disk space, click the trash icon next to any downloaded model in Model Library. The file is removed immediately and can be re-downloaded any time.

Which should I pick?

Privacy is non-negotiable / offline

An on-device speech model. Apple Speech for instant Mac dictation, or Parakeet / Nemotron for higher accuracy. Audio never leaves your machine.

I want the best accuracy, no setup

HyperWhisper Cloud — Highest (ElevenLabs Scribe v2). No API key, pay only for speech.

I speak a non-European language, offline

Nemotron 3.5 (Multilingual) — on-device coverage for Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, and ~40 languages total.

Older laptop / no dedicated GPU

Whisper Tiny or Small — runs comfortably on CPU. For longer audio, switch to HyperWhisper Cloud.

English only, want it fast & local

Parakeet V2 (English) — typically faster than equivalent Whisper with comparable accuracy.

I already have a provider key

Bring your own key — plug it in and pay the provider directly. See API Keys.

Boost accuracy on any model

• Custom vocabulary — add product names, jargon, and colleagues’ names. The single biggest improvement for technical or professional use. (Support varies by model — Apple Speech and Whisper support it locally; among cloud providers most do, a few don’t.)
• Low-noise environment — every model degrades with background noise. See Best Practices.
• Natural pace — speech that’s too fast or too slow both hurt accuracy.

Go deeper

Providers

HyperWhisper Cloud tiers, per-minute pricing, cost examples, and accuracy by language.

API Keys

Set up bring-your-own-key access for any supported provider.