Transcription built for agents, scripts, and products.

curl https://www.plainscribe.com/api/v1/uploads \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $PLAINSCRIBE_API_KEY" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: upload-interview-001" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "file_name": "interview.mp3",
    "size_bytes": 18432000,
    "content_type": "audio/mpeg"
  }'

Upload the bytes to the returned URL, preserving the returned Content-Type header.

curl https://www.plainscribe.com/api/v1/transcriptions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $PLAINSCRIBE_API_KEY" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: transcribe-interview-001" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "source": {
      "type": "upload",
      "upload_id": "UPLOAD_ID"
    },
    "mode": "transcription"
  }'

// npm install tus-js-client@4.3.1
// PLAINSCRIBE_API_KEY=... node transcribe.mjs ./interview.mp3 audio/mpeg
import { createReadStream } from 'node:fs'
import { stat } from 'node:fs/promises'
import path from 'node:path'
import { randomUUID } from 'node:crypto'
import * as tus from 'tus-js-client'

const API_BASE = 'https://www.plainscribe.com/api/v1'
const apiKey = process.env.PLAINSCRIBE_API_KEY
const [filePath, contentType = 'audio/mpeg'] = process.argv.slice(2)
if (!apiKey || !filePath) throw new Error('API key and file path are required')

async function api(route, options = {}) {
  const response = await fetch(API_BASE + route, {
    ...options,
    headers: {
      Authorization: 'Bearer ' + apiKey,
      ...(options.body ? { 'Content-Type': 'application/json' } : {}),
      ...options.headers,
    },
  })
  if (!response.ok) throw new Error(response.status + ': ' + await response.text())
  return response.json()
}

const file = await stat(filePath)
// Generate each key once. If a POST times out, retry it with the same key and unchanged body.
const uploadIdempotencyKey = randomUUID()
const reservation = await api('/uploads', {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: { 'Idempotency-Key': uploadIdempotencyKey },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    file_name: path.basename(filePath),
    size_bytes: file.size,
    content_type: contentType,
  }),
})

const config = reservation.resumable_upload
const metadata = Object.fromEntries(
  config.headers['Upload-Metadata'].split(',').map((entry) => {
    const separator = entry.indexOf(' ')
    return [
      entry.slice(0, separator),
      Buffer.from(entry.slice(separator + 1), 'base64').toString('utf8'),
    ]
  }),
)

await new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
  new tus.Upload(createReadStream(filePath), {
    endpoint: config.endpoint,
    headers: { 'x-signature': config.headers['x-signature'] },
    metadata,
    uploadSize: file.size,
    chunkSize: config.chunk_size_bytes,
    retryDelays: [0, 3000, 5000, 10000, 20000],
    onError: reject,
    onSuccess: resolve,
  }).start()
})

const transcriptionIdempotencyKey = randomUUID()
let job = await api('/transcriptions', {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: { 'Idempotency-Key': transcriptionIdempotencyKey },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    source: { type: 'upload', upload_id: reservation.id },
    mode: 'transcription',
  }),
})

while (job.status === 'pending' || job.status === 'processing') {
  await new Promise((resolve) => setTimeout(resolve, 5000))
  job = await api('/transcriptions/' + job.id)
}
if (job.status !== 'completed') throw new Error(job.error?.message || 'Failed')

const result = await fetch(job.links.result + '?format=txt', {
  headers: { Authorization: 'Bearer ' + apiKey },
})
if (!result.ok) throw new Error(result.status + ': ' + await result.text())
console.log(await result.text())

API uploads accept AAC, AIF, AIFC, AIFF, AU, AVI, CAF, FLAC, M4A, M4V, MKV, MOV, MP3, MP4, MPEG, MPG, OGA, OGG, OPUS, TS, WAV, WAVE, WEBA, and WEBM files up to 1GB.