LibreAI / Clipping / WhisperX
// clipping · m-bain/whisperX

WhisperX

WhisperX — Whisper transcription with word-level timestamps and speaker diarization: 70x realtime batched inference, forced phoneme alignment, BSD-2-Clause

★ 24.7k stars⑂ 2.5k forksBSD-2-Clauseupdated 2026-10
▦ visual — this project's README ships no embeddable screenshot,
so here's a placeholder. The guide below is complete regardless.
// project facts

Project facts

WhisperX is an open-source clipping project by m-bain (m-bain/whisperX on GitHub). It has 24,669 GitHub stars and 2,490 forks, is released under the BSD-2-Clause license, and was last updated on GitHub on 18 October 2026.

Repository
m-bain/whisperX
GitHub stars
24,669
Forks
2,490
License
BSD-2-Clause
Last updated on GitHub
18 October 2026
Category
Clipping
Listing
Full install guide
// how it works

How it works

  1. Install WhisperX

    The simple route from the README: pip install whisperx (install the CUDA toolkit first if you want GPU acceleration; CPU works without it).

  2. Transcribe a file

    Run whisperx on an audio or video file — it transcribes, aligns word-level timestamps and (with diarization enabled and a Hugging Face token) labels speakers.

  3. Use the timestamps

    Take the JSON/SRT/VTT output into your subtitle, clipping or editing pipeline — word timings and speaker turns are already in the file.

// features

Why people love it

Word-level timestamps

Forced phoneme alignment turns Whisper segments into accurate per-word timings — the feature plain Whisper lacks.

Speaker diarization

Who said what, labelled per segment, alongside the transcript.

70x realtime batching

VAD-based batched inference on faster-whisper makes long recordings cheap to process on a GPU.

Pipeline-ready outputs

JSON, SRT, VTT and other subtitle formats that clipping and editing tools consume directly.

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// run it

Run it yourself

  1. Install from PyPI

    The README recommended route.

    pip install whisperx
  2. Speed up alignment (optional)

    The README fast extra: Numba JIT for the alignment loops on long files.

    pip install "whisperx[fast]"
  3. Transcribe

    Basic CLI use; add --diarize and alignment options per the README for the full pipeline.

    whisperx path/to/audio.mp3 --model large-v2
// use cases

What you can build

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// faq

Questions, answered

Who makes WhisperX?

Max Bain (m-bain/whisperX on GitHub); the underlying ASR is OpenAI Whisper via faster-whisper, with wav2vec2 alignment models.

Is WhisperX free?

Yes — BSD-2-Clause licensed. Diarization models from Hugging Face may ask you to accept their terms and use a token, per the README.

How is it different from plain Whisper?

Whisper gives you segment-level text. WhisperX adds accurate word-level timestamps via forced alignment, speaker diarization, and much faster batched inference — the three things production pipelines actually need.

How does it compare to a well-known alternative?

Against faster-whisper alone, WhisperX is the full pipeline (alignment + diarization) rather than just the fast ASR engine — it is built on faster-whisper. Against hosted transcription APIs, it runs locally and free, at the cost of your own GPU time.

How do I get started?

pip install whisperx, then whisperx yourfile.mp3 --model large-v2. Add --diarize once you have a Hugging Face token configured.

// keep exploring

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// alternatives

Alternatives in Clipping

The most-starred other Clipping projects in the LibreAI catalogue — the realistic shortlist if WhisperX is not the right fit.

Get WhisperX

Free and open — grab the source, star the repo, and start creating.