Fix slow or failed transcription
Last updated: October 28, 2026
Available on: Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android
If Flow shows Taking longer than usual…, stalls while processing, or produces no text, check your connection and retry the saved recording. Recovery depends on whether Flow captured and kept the audio.
If Flow reports microphone-access trouble or silent audio, follow microphone troubleshooting instead. If text exists but did not insert, use Fix text not pasting after dictation rather than recording it again.
Check the connection and restart
Warning: Finish active dictation or meeting recording and let meeting audio finish saving before restarting. If an update asks you to Restart anyway, unsaved audio may be lost; choose Cancel to wait.
After each check, dictate a short phrase. If text appears, stop — except after step 4, where you must complete step 5 first.
Load a website. If it does not load, restore your internet connection first.
Check for updates: on desktop, open Flow's menu-bar or system-tray menu (or the Wispr Flow app menu on Mac) and choose Check for updates...; on your phone, use the App Store or Google Play Store. On Android, complete any required-update screen before continuing.
Quit and reopen Flow using Quit and relaunch Wispr Flow.
Test without your VPN or proxy.
Re-enable it and configure approved access if results change; on managed networks, contact your IT administrator.
Updates are managed by your organization means your organization controls updates. Update errors offer Restart and Contact us.
Retry a saved recording
Reconnect first. Retry sends the saved audio again; it cannot recover speech the microphone never captured or audio that was deleted or is no longer kept. A missing-audio or audio-capture error means the saved audio is unavailable, so dictate again.
Mac and Windows
Note: If your own or your organization's data setting is never store, History disabled replaces the list. No audio is kept for retry, recovery, playback or download, regardless of age or duration. You can change your own setting in Settings > Data and Privacy.
Warning: Do not dismiss recovery while you wait for an interrupted result — that cancels it and can stop the earlier transcript from pasting. If recovery cannot finish, check History for saved audio.
If stopping or processing cannot finish, Flow ends the stuck session and refreshes History. Something's not right signals a transcription failure or stall; its Retry button retries the last transcript and pastes it into the focused field. To recover through History instead:
Choose Open History on the error notice, or open Flow's Dictation page.
Choose Retry or ⋯ → Retry transcript for the entry, or Recover for a dismissed or stuck entry.
Copy the recovered text when it replaces the failed entry.
Paste it into your text field; History retries do not paste automatically.
Retry controls: Inline Retry requires a failed or empty recording of at least five seconds; for shorter recordings use ⋯ → Retry transcript. Recover has no duration minimum. Both inline controls require an entry no older than 14 days, and recovery still needs saved audio.
Audio age: Audio expires after 14 days, except for recordings still awaiting upload. Older entries lose playback, download and inline recovery controls even if audio remains; ⋯ → Retry transcript stays available but cannot recover expired audio.
No captured audio: Couldn't access your microphone. has no inline Retry or Recover link, and although its ⋯ menu still lists Retry transcript, no usable audio was saved. Audio is silent. means Flow detected no words.
Retry results: Retry is blocked while you dictate, and long retries can take minutes. If a retry times out or a new dictation takes over, the original entry and audio remain without the generic failure message. Other retry errors show Retry failed. Please try again. and leave the entry in its earlier state.
Recovered formatting: A retry notification can open History and automatically retry its saved entry.
Interrupted, cancelled or long recordings
On desktop, Is your internet connected? is advisory: recording still starts. If Flow quits mid-dictation, saved unfinished audio offers Recover on the next launch.
If only part of a transcript came back, Flow pastes that part; if nothing came back, you get the usual error with Retry.
Pressing the dictation shortcut during processing does not start another recording. Flow was processing your last transcript offers Cancel and your dismiss shortcut, defaulting to Esc. Cancellation shows Transcript cancelled with Undo, or a detailed recovery card with Open History and Undo.
Desktop recordings warn at 19 minutes and stop at 20. Transcription session ended. offers Recover text, which pastes the last transcript into the focused field; if no field was focused, use the notice's Copy button. If the microphone disconnected mid-dictation, the notice's Insert action inserts the text transcribed so far.
Recover text on your phone
iPhone
History offers Retry on every row, not only failed ones; the inline button appears only on failed rows without text, and tapping a failed row's text also retries it.
Open History.
Swipe left or long-press any row and choose Retry.
Tap the successful row's text to copy it.
Paste it into your text field.
Retry and Delete are unavailable while that row retries. Tap-to-copy and long-press Copy require a non-failed row with text; swipe Copy also works on failed rows containing text. If the saved audio cannot be read, Retry cannot resend it.
A dropped or stalled connection can end dictation; check History for the saved entry.
Recovery notifications require notification permission granted earlier and never prompt for it; without permission the notification is skipped, not the saved entry. They apply when the keyboard is inactive and the dictation is not a command-mode query:
Failure without text: Your dictation is saved / Tap to retry opens History and retries that entry, at most once per dictation, and not for silent or user-cancelled dictations.
Interruption or time limit: When text exists after a call/Siri interruption or the five-minute recording cap, Your dictation was interrupted or Your dictation reached the time limit says Tap to view your transcript. Tapping opens History and copies the text; paste it into your field. The time-limit notice does not appear if you stopped recording yourself.
In the keyboard, generic transcription errors and cancelled dictations offer Retry; audio-capture and network errors do not. Follow any Full Access or microphone-permission prompt before recording again.
Android
Failed dictations stay in History, with audio when captured. Failed to transcribe. Saved in the app. points you there. The Wispr icon on a transcription error starts a new dictation rather than retrying, and dismisses the error without discarding it.
Tap the bubble's Retry, or open the failed History card and choose ⋮ → Retry Transcript.
Check for recovered text; if retry fails, check whether the recording is still in History.
Copy recovered text from the updated History card, if you retried there.
Paste the copied text into your field.
A successful History retry updates the existing card rather than creating another. History errors include Retry failed. Audio file not found., Retry failed. Audio file missing. and Retry failed. Please try again.
Without an attached recording, or if its file is gone, the bubble's Retry returns to the ready bubble without recovering text.
Switching accounts deletes local History and audio.
Starting offline, by tap or hold-to-talk, shows No internet. Try again later. and does not start recording; if connectivity drops after hold-to-talk starts, releasing still submits. The five-minute limit warns at 3:59 and stops and submits captured audio at 4:59. Full storage prevents recording.
Battery or data limits can interfere; follow Setup Wispr Flow on Android. If prompted, re-grant accessibility or tap to restart; repair prompts appear with a focused text field, not during dictation. Flow Bubble reconnected. confirms recovery.
Resolve a storage warning
Desktop storage notices offer Restart Flow and Contact us, and cannot be muted. After restarting, check whether the warning returns.
Warning: Restarting after genuine Local database corruption deletes corrupted local data rather than repairing it, losing local History, Notes and meetings. A local backup is not guaranteed to recover it.
Notice | Action |
Local database corruption | Choose Restart Flow after considering the data-loss warning above. |
Storage Full | Free disk space before restarting; restarting alone cannot free space. |
There was an error | Restart Flow, then contact support if the error returns. |
Reset only if support advises it
Warning: Reset & restart deletes local History, Notes and attached images, notifications, meetings and calendar events. Your dictionary, stats and settings stay saved and re-sync; backups are not deleted.
Get support guidance before resetting.
Save any local content you need.
Follow the reset steps support provides for your device.
Confirm Reset and restart?; Flow restarts automatically.
Dictate a short phrase after restarting. If it still fails, contact support.
Still stuck?
Contact support if every dictation is delayed, multiple recordings fail to retry, or storage warnings return. Include your platform, device, the exact message, the checks you tried, whether another network changes the result, and a failed History entry when available.
On desktop, choose Talk to support from Flow's menu-bar/system-tray menu or Mac Help menu. You can report a History entry on desktop, iPhone or Android; on Android, choose Report an issue or Report transcription for a specific recording.
If Android cannot sync the transcription, the report is not sent. An unreadable or unsupported attachment also blocks submission; use PNG, JPEG, BMP or WebP under 10 MB. If your report could not be sent, submit it again; Your transcription report was sent. confirms delivery.