
Cover image credits: dribbble
Some time ago,speech recognition API was added to thespecs and we gotpartial support on Chrome, Safari, Baidu, android webview, iOS safari, samsung internet and Kaios browsers (see browser support in detail).
Disclaimer: This implementation won't work in Opera (as it doesn't support the constructor) and also won't work in FireFox (because it doesn't support a single thing of it) so if you're using one of those, I suggest you to use Chrome -or any other compatible browser- if you want to take a try.
Speech recognition code and PoC
Edit: I realised that for any reason it won't work when embedded sohere's the link to open it directly.
The implementation I made currently supports English and Spanish just to showcase.
Quick instructions and feature overview:
- Choose one of the languages from the drop down.
- Hit the mic icon and it will start recording (you'll notice a weird animation).
- Once you finish a sentence it will write it down in the box.
- When you want it to stop recording, simply press the mic again (animation stops).
- You can also hit the box to copy the text in your clipboard.
Speech Recognition in the Browser with JavaScript - key code blocks:
/* Check whether the SpeechRecognition or the webkitSpeechRecognition API is available on window and reference it */constrecognitionSvc=window.SpeechRecognition||window.webkitSpeechRecognition;// Instantiate itconstrecognition=newrecognitionSvc();/* Set the speech recognition to continuous so it keeps listening to whatever you say. This way you can record long texts, conversations and so on. */recognition.continuous=true;/* Sets the language for speech recognition. It uses IETF tags, ISO 639-1 like en-GB, en-US, es-ES and so on */recognition.lang='en-GB';// Start the speech recognitionrecognition.start();// Event triggered when it gets a matchrecognition.onresult=(event)=>{// iterate through speech recognition resultsfor(constresultofevent.results){// Print the transcription to the consoleconsole.log(`${result[0].transcript}`);}}// Stop the speech recognitionrecognition.stop();
This implementation currently supports the following languages for speech recognition:
- en-GB
- en-US
- es-ES
- de-DE
- de-CH
- fr-FR
If you want me toadd support for more languages tell me in the comment sections and I'm updating it in a blink so you can test it on your own language 😁
That's all for today, hope you enjoyed I sure did doing that
Top comments(22)

- LocationCyprus
- WorkCEO and Founder of AINIRO Ltd
- Joined
Cool. I once created a speech based speech recognition thing based upon MySQL and SoundEx allowing me to create code by speaking through my headphones. It was based upon creating a hierarchical “menu” where I could say “Create button”. Then the machine would respond with “what button”, etc. The thing of course produced Hyperlambda though. I doubt it can be done without meta programming.
One thing that bothers me is that this was 5 years ago, and speech support has basically stood 100% perfectly still in all browsers since then … 😕

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
One thing that bothers me is that this was 5 years ago, and speech support has basically stood 100% perfectly still in all browsers since then … 😕
Not in all of them, (e.g. Opera mini, FireFox mobile), it's a nice to have in browsers, specially targeting accessibility, but screen readers for blind people do the job and, on the other hand, most implementations for any other purpose send data to a backend using streams so they can process the incoming speech plus use the user feedback to train an IA among others and without hurting the performance.
...allowing me to create code by speaking through my headphones...... I doubt it can be done without meta programming.
I agree on this. The concept "metaprogramming" is extense and covers different ways in which it can work (or be implemented) and from its own definition it is a building block for this kind of applications.

This is really awesome. Could you please add the Turkish language? I would definitely like to try this in my native language and use it in my projects.

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
Added! 😁

Thanks :)

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
Thank you! 🤖

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
I can try, do you know the IETF/ISO language code for it? 😁

Thanks you 🙏. I'd like that you put in french too.

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
Done! 😁

- LocationRio de Janeiro, RJ
- EducationMaster Degree
- WorkFullStack and Mobile Developer
- Joined
Thank you 🙏. I'd like that you put in Brazilian Portuguse too.

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
Added both Portugal and Brazilian portuguese 😁

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
Thank you! 😁

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
I added support for some extra languages in the mean time 😁

Thank you very much for your useful article and implementation. Does it support Greek?
Have a nice (programming) day

- LocationSpain
- EducationHigher Level Education Certificate on Web Application Development
- WorkTech Lead/Lead Dev
- Joined
Hi Symeon, added support for Greekel-GR
, try it out! 😃
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