Transcription requests

A podcast’s older episodes are its back catalogue: we list them with their feed metadata, but have not transcribed them. Request one, and we transcribe it. Once it is transcribed it keeps its ID, and every episode endpoint serves its transcript, speakers, entities, topics, segments, ads and clips, exactly as for any other episode. Requests belong to your organization, so they need an organization’s API key. They are not available through per-request payment (x402), which has no organization to hold them.

Find episodes to request

Back-catalogue episodes read transcript_status: requestable. List a show’s with transcript_status=requestable:

curl "https://api.particle.pro/v1/podcasts/crime-junkie/episodes?transcript_status=requestable&published_before=2020-01-01" \
  -H "X-API-Key: $PARTICLE_API_KEY"

GET /v1/podcasts/{id}?include=coverage counts a show’s episodes by transcript_status and by year, to plan requests without paging through them.

Request a transcript

Send one episode per request:

curl -X POST "https://api.particle.pro/v1/podcasts/transcription/requests" \
  -H "X-API-Key: $PARTICLE_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"episode_id": "5HZ8M9tlTQ0yTgtObZ5zJs"}'

A request that queues the episode answers 202 with the new request:

{
  "id": "5zFTy7HD96FeUt9QPOXNXi",
  "episode_id": "5HZ8M9tlTQ0yTgtObZ5zJs",
  "podcast_id": "sOFDtTJovkWaaEhasy1E4",
  "state": "queued",
  "created_at": "2026-10-02T05:40:56.278899Z"
}

Only a 202 is billed as a transcription request, at your plan’s price for POST /v1/podcasts/transcription/requests. Every other successful request answers 200 and is billed at the regular lookup price, because there is nothing new to transcribe:

You requested	Response
An episode you requested before	Your existing request.
An episode another organization’s request already queued	Your own request, which follows the same transcription.
An episode we already hold	No request is created: there is no `id`, and `state` says where its transcript stands.

So requesting an episode again, or one somebody else is already paying to transcribe, never costs a second transcription.

Follow a request

A request moves through these states:

`state`	Meaning
`queued`	Waiting its turn. The episode reads `transcript_status: queued`.
`admitted`	Being transcribed (`admitted_at` is when it started). The episode reads `transcript_status: processing`.
`transcribed`	The transcript is available (`completed_at` is when). The episode reads `transcript_status: transcribed`.
`failed`	It will not be transcribed. `failure_reason` says why, for example `enclosure_gone` when the publisher has removed the audio, `podcast_removed` when the podcast has left the catalog, or `timed_out` when transcription did not finish in time.

A request starts transcribing within seconds while there is capacity. When there is not, it waits its turn, with organizations served by plan and then evenly, so one organization’s large backlog does not hold up everyone else’s requests. Follow it with either of:

GET /v1/podcasts/transcription/requests/{id}, the request itself;
GET /v1/podcasts/episodes/{id}, whose transcript_status changes as the request does.

{
  "id": "5zFTy7HD96FeUt9QPOXNXi",
  "episode_id": "5HZ8M9tlTQ0yTgtObZ5zJs",
  "podcast_id": "sOFDtTJovkWaaEhasy1E4",
  "state": "transcribed",
  "created_at": "2026-10-02T05:40:56.278899Z",
  "admitted_at": "2026-10-02T05:41:12.435531Z",
  "completed_at": "2026-10-02T05:43:17.079322Z"
}

GET /v1/podcasts/transcription/requests lists your organization’s requests, newest first, filtered by state and podcast_id. Reading requests is never billed. A back-catalogue episode does not appear in the episode feed or stream when it is transcribed: they carry the episodes podcasts publish, and an old episode transcribed today is not news. Follow your requests instead.

Limits and turnaround

GET /v1/podcasts/transcription returns what you need to plan, and is never billed:

{
  "limits": {
    "open_requests": 12,
    "open_requests_limit": 200,
    "daily_requests": 40,
    "daily_requests_limit": 500,
    "daily_requests_resets_at": "2026-10-03T05:40:56.278899Z"
  },
  "requests": [
    { "state": "queued", "count": 9 },
    { "state": "admitted", "count": 3 },
    { "state": "transcribed", "count": 28 },
    { "state": "failed", "count": 0 }
  ],
  "queue": {
    "queued_episodes": 9,
    "median_turnaround_seconds": 131,
    "p90_turnaround_seconds": 412
  }
}

limits: how many requests your organization may have open at once, and make in 24 hours, and how much of each you have used. Past either, a request answers 429 transcription_request_limit_exceeded with a Retry-After header, and is not billed.
queue: the episodes waiting across every organization, and the median and 90th percentile time from request to transcript over the last 7 days.

Errors

Status	Error code	When
`404`	`not_found`	No episode has that ID, or its podcast is no longer in the catalog.
`422`	`episode_audio_unavailable`	The episode’s feed entry has no playable audio, or the publisher’s server says the audio no longer exists.
`429`	`transcription_request_limit_exceeded`	Your organization is at one of its limits.

None of these is billed.

Getting started

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Find episodes to request

Request a transcript

Follow a request

Limits and turnaround

Errors

​Find episodes to request

​Request a transcript

​Follow a request

​Limits and turnaround

​Errors

Find episodes to request

Request a transcript

Follow a request

Limits and turnaround

Errors