Gladia CLI - Gladia

Transcribe audio from your terminal. One install, one command, no boilerplate. The Gladia CLI wraps the Gladia speech-to-text API for terminals, shell scripts, and pipelines — 100+ languages, speaker diarization, and code switching in a single command.

Get your API key from the Gladia dashboard before running your first transcription.

Why use the CLI

One command away — Install the CLI, set your API key, run gladia transcribe.
Flexible output — Get plain text, JSON, SRT, or VTT straight to stdout.
Full feature set — Speaker diarization, multilingual configuration, and model selection (solaria-1, solaria-3).
Files or URLs — Transcribe a local recording or a remote link, with no download step.
Pipe-friendly — Machine-readable output for shell scripts and CI pipelines.

Install

# macOS & Linux
curl -fsSL https://github.com/gladiaio/gladia-cli/releases/latest/download/install.sh | sh

# Windows (PowerShell)
powershell -c "irm https://github.com/gladiaio/gladia-cli/releases/latest/download/install.ps1 | iex"

Other platforms and binaries are available on GitHub releases.

Quick start

gladia auth set your_key

gladia transcribe meeting.wav               # transcript to stdout
gladia transcribe podcast.mp3 -o srt        # subtitles instead
gladia transcribe call.wav --diarize        # label who spoke when
gladia languages                            # list supported language codes

API key setup

Provide your API key in one of three ways (checked in this order):

export GLADIA_API_KEY=your_key              # 1. environment variable
gladia auth set your_key                    # 2. saved to ~/.gladia (mode 0600)
gladia transcribe meeting.wav --gladia-key your_key   # 3. per-command flag

Everyday examples

# Transcribe a local file or a remote URL
gladia transcribe meeting.wav
gladia transcribe https://example.com/audio.mp3 -o json

# Narrow language detection to a shortlist
gladia transcribe podcast.mp3 --language en,fr,de

# Mixed-language audio: re-detect on every utterance
gladia transcribe mixed.mp3 --code-switching --language en,fr

# Who spoke when, as subtitles
gladia transcribe call.wav --diarize -o srt

# Pick a model
gladia transcribe podcast.mp3 --model solaria-3 --language en

# Machine-readable output in a pipeline
gladia transcribe interview.mp3 -o json | jq '.transcription'

Commands

Command	Description
`transcribe <file-or-url>`	Transcribe an audio file or URL
`auth set <key>`	Save API key to `~/.gladia`
`languages`	List supported ISO 639-1 codes
`completion <shell>`	Generate shell tab completion (bash, zsh, fish, powershell)

Output formats

Use -o or --output to control how the transcript is returned:

Format	Description
`text`	Plain transcript (default)
`json`	Structured JSON transcript
`json-full`	Full API response as JSON
`srt`	SubRip subtitles
`vtt`	WebVTT subtitles

Transcription options

Flag	Default	Description
`-o`, `--output`	`text`	Output format: `text`, `json`, `json-full`, `srt`, `vtt`
`--language`	—	Expected language(s), comma-separated (`en` or `en,fr,de`); narrows detection
`--cs`, `--code-switching`	off	Re-detect language on each utterance (mixed-language audio; `solaria-1` only)
`--diarize`	off	Identify speakers in the transcript
`--model`	—	STT model: `solaria-1` or `solaria-3`. Solaria-3 accepts at most one `--language` (`en`, `fr`, `de`, `es`, or `it`) and does not support code switching.
`-v`, `--verbose`	off	Show progress while polling

Global flag (any command): --gladia-key — API key if not set in the environment or ~/.gladia.

Language

Goal	What to run
Auto-detect	`gladia transcribe <file>`
Constrain detection	`--language en,fr,de`
Code switching	`--code-switching` (+ optional `--language` hints)

--language limits which language(s) Gladia considers. A comma-separated list is a hint list, not per-utterance switching.
--code-switching turns on per-utterance language detection. Add --language to restrict which languages may appear. Not available with solaria-3.

Diarization

Use --diarize when you need who spoke when. Speaker labels are included in the output (for example, Speaker 0: …).

gladia transcribe meeting.wav --diarize
gladia transcribe panel.mp3 --diarize -o srt

Shell completion

When you install via install.sh or install.ps1, the script offers to configure tab completion for your shell. To skip the prompt (for example in CI), set GLADIA_NO_COMPLETION_PROMPT=1. You can also set up completion manually:

# bash
source <(gladia completion bash)

# zsh
mkdir -p ~/.zsh/completions
gladia completion zsh > ~/.zsh/completions/_gladia

# fish
mkdir -p ~/.config/fish/completions
gladia completion fish > ~/.config/fish/completions/gladia.fish

Run gladia completion --help for full instructions per shell.

Next steps

Get your API key

Create an API key on the Gladia dashboard

Gladia CLI on GitHub

Source code, issues, and releases

Pre-recorded STT quickstart

Learn more about Gladia transcription features

​Why use the CLI

​Install

​Quick start

​API key setup

​Everyday examples

​Commands

​Output formats

​Transcription options

​Language

​Diarization

​Shell completion

​Next steps

Get your API key

Gladia CLI on GitHub

Pre-recorded STT quickstart

Why use the CLI

Install

Quick start

API key setup

Everyday examples

Commands

Output formats

Transcription options

Language

Diarization

Shell completion

Next steps