Compact commercial models tuned for ordinary CPUs, not expensive GPUs. They cost 5–20× less to run, with lower latency, passed on to you.
Pay by audio hour for live streams and recorded files alike. Because Kroko runs efficiently on CPUs, volume pricing goes well below GPU-bound ASR providers, from $0.02/hr.
Popular cloud speech-to-text providers list at roughly $150–$460 per 1,000 hours of audio. Kroko shown at $0.02/hr volume pricing (≈$20). Illustrative; verify current rates before relying on it.
Hosted streaming & pre-recorded transcription in our European cloud.
Commercial models on your own infrastructure.
Embed compact commercial models in your app.
Real-time speech-to-text with the deployment reach to run in the cloud, on-premise, and on-device.
| Provider | Self-host | On-device |
|---|---|---|
Cloud · on-prem · on-device · CPU-first commercial models | ✓ | ✓ |
| AssemblyAIUniversal-Streaming, cloud only | ✕ | ✕ |
| SpeechmaticsStandard tier, cloud + container | ✓ | ✕ |
| ElevenLabsScribe, cloud only | ✕ | ✕ |
| DeepgramNova-3 streaming, cloud + self-host | ✓ | ✕ |
Deployment options based on publicly documented capabilities, 2026. Comparison for general guidance; verify current availability with each provider.
On the Open ASR benchmark (average word error rate across eight datasets), Kroko places 2nd of 9, ahead of ElevenLabs, AssemblyAI, Google and Whisper, and within 0.2 points of the leader. All while running on commodity CPUs.
Average WER (%) across AMI, Earnings-22, GigaSpeech, LibriSpeech (clean & other), SPGISpeech, TED-LIUM and VoxPopuli. Lower is better. Source: Open ASR benchmark, 2026. Selected vendors shown; Kroko ranks 2nd of 9 overall.
The same CPU-first stack powers live voice agents and post-call workflows: streaming returns partials as audio arrives, pre-recorded returns final transcripts with timing detail.
Voice agents, live captions, PBX call monitoring, agent assist, accessibility and voice commands.
Call recordings, meetings, voicemail, media subtitles, post-call QA, analytics and searchable archives.
Use Kroko through a hosted European API, run it on your own infrastructure, or embed compact models on-device where offline transcription matters.
Hosted in European infrastructure. WebSocket APIs for both streaming and pre-recorded transcription, with high availability.
Run streaming and post-processed models on your own servers, with deployment options for HIPAA- and GDPR-regulated workloads.
Mobile, browser and edge. Offline-capable with no cloud round trip, where supported.
Where your speech data is processed decides whose laws govern it. Kroko lets you keep that firmly in Europe, or entirely inside your own network.
US laws such as the CLOUD Act and FISA Section 702 can compel American-owned cloud providers to hand data to US authorities, regardless of where their servers physically sit.
Hosted and operated in Europe, under EU jurisdiction and GDPR.
Run on your own servers, so audio and transcripts never leave your network.
Transcribe offline on the device itself, with nothing sent anywhere.
Models tuned for commodity CPUs instead of GPU-heavy inference. They cost 5–20× less to run, with lower latency, stronger recognition quality, and the support and licensing production teams need.
Compact commercial models run efficiently on the cloud, on-prem and edge CPUs you already have, with no GPUs to rent, queue for, or babysit.
No GPU-heavy inference pipeline means fewer expensive accelerators and simpler capacity planning, with savings we pass on, from $0.02/hr at volume.
At a 10× real-time CPU target, you add capacity on cheap CPU instances, not scarce, expensive GPUs that gate your growth.
Stream live audio for partial transcripts, or send recorded files for final transcripts with timing detail. Use the hosted API, run on-premise, or embed on-device.
Read the quick start// Live audio → partial + final transcripts const ws = new WebSocket( "wss://app.kroko.ai/api/v1/transcripts/streaming" + "?apiKey=YOUR_KEY&languageCode=en-US" ); ws.onmessage = (e) => { const r = JSON.parse(e.data); if (r.type === "partial") showLive(r.text); if (r.type === "final") appendSegment(r.text); }; // then send 16 kHz mono PCM chunks
// Recorded file → final transcript + timestamps const ws = new WebSocket( "wss://app.kroko.ai/api/v1/transcripts/pre-recorded" + "?apiKey=YOUR_KEY&languageCode=en-US" ); // send metadata header + audio chunks, // then "Done" when the upload completes ws.onmessage = (e) => { const { segments } = JSON.parse(e.data); render(segments); // word + segment timing };
# Run the same models on your own box, no GPU docker run -p 8080:8080 kroko/asr:on-prem # Point the WebSocket client at your server wss://localhost:8080/api/v1/transcripts/streaming # Streaming + post-processed models, fully private
Kroko currently supports 13 languages, with more in active development:
Get an API key for the hosted service, or run the same commercial models on your own hardware for private deployments.
The demo downloads our open community model (a few tens of MB) and runs speech-to-text entirely in your browser. Nothing is sent to a server, and no audio ever leaves your device. Give it a few seconds to load, then start talking.
This is the community build. Our commercial models ship even smaller, run at lower latency, and score a lower word error rate in production.
Runs best in a recent Chrome, Edge or Safari. Microphone permission required.
Tell us what you're interested in and we'll open a pre-filled email to our team. We typically reply within one business day.
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