import torch
from transformers import pipeline
pipe = pipeline(
"automatic-speech-recognition",
model="digiphyte/fluister-turbo-transformers",
torch_dtype=torch.float16,
device="cuda",
)
print(pipe("audio.wav", generate_kwargs={"language": "af"})["text"])
Tell it the language ("af" or "en") rather than relying on auto-detect. For mixed
Afrikaans/English conversations, "af" handles the code-switch well.
Core ML / WhisperKit (iOS and macOS)
This is a standard Transformers Whisper checkpoint, so it feeds straight into
whisperkittools to produce a WhisperKit Core ML
package for on-device Apple inference.
Evaluation
NCHLT read-speech test sets: Afrikaans WER 0.086, English WER 0.017 (identical weights to
the CT2 build). Validated on real SA audio: an Afrikaans physiotherapy intake, an English project
meeting, and an Afrikaans/English code-switched conversation. Clean Afrikaans where stock Whisper
drifts to Dutch spellings ("gebou" not "gebouw", "mense" not "mensen"), intact code-switching, and
accurate SA English.
Limitations
Same as the CT2 build. Fluister narrows specific failures (Whisper spelling Afrikaans as Dutch;
degrading SA English); it does not change the base model size. Language auto-detect can still
mislabel audio (tell it the language), and proper nouns, numbers, and rare or technical terms can
still be wrong. South African place names and surnames in particular are a known gap we are still
improving.
Licence and attribution
MIT (see LICENSE). This is a derivative work; the base model (OpenAI Whisper, Apache-2.0) and the
training data (andreoosthuizen/afrikaans-30s, CC-BY-4.0; NCHLT afr/eng, CC-BY-3.0) are
credited in NOTICE.