iOS: Missing audio chunks during unstable internet

Last updated: April 23, 2026

Available on: iOS

If words or sentences are missing from your dictation after your internet dropped, this guide helps you recover the audio and prevent it from happening again. Most issues resolve in under 2 minutes.

Quick checks

  • Is your connection stable now? Try loading a webpage — if it's slow or fails, wait for a better connection before retrying.

  • Is Flow up to date? Several audio recovery bugs were fixed in recent versions.

  • Did audio recording fail during keyboard dictation? Flow shows a dedicated error screen with Dismiss and Retry options. The screen closes automatically if retry succeeds.

  • Does the dictation appear in history? Open the Home tab and look for the affected entry. If you can see it, you can retry the transcription. If the entry is missing entirely, the audio was not saved — contact support.

How to recover missing audio

When your internet connection becomes unstable during a dictation, the audio stream may be interrupted and a portion of your audio may not be transcribed on the first attempt. Your audio is saved locally for most failure scenarios and can be retried from history. If you manually cancel a recording in progress, it is not saved to history.

  1. Open your dictation history by tapping the Home tab at the bottom of the screen.

  2. Tap the affected dictation. If the transcription is empty, tapping it automatically retries. If text is present, long-press the entry for a context menu with Copy, Retry, Report, and Delete.

  3. Wait a few seconds for the transcription to complete. The full text appears in your history.

The updated text appears shortly after retrying — history refreshes automatically. You can retry as many times as needed.

Tip: Swipe left on any history item to quickly access Report, Retry, and Copy (Copy only appears when text is present).

Note: Flow automatically checks the most recent transcription for corruption the first time you open the Home tab and retries it if needed. This check runs once per session.

Note: When you delete a transcript from history, it only disappears from the list once the deletion has been confirmed. If your connection is unstable and the deletion fails, the transcript stays visible so you can try again when your connection improves.

How to prevent this

  • Check your connection: Make sure you have a stable Wi-Fi or cellular connection before dictating.

  • Stay on one network: Avoid dictating while moving between networks (e.g., leaving Wi-Fi range).

  • Keep dictations short: Dictations under 5 minutes are less likely to be affected by brief network interruptions.

  • Avoid audio interruptions: Incoming phone calls may interrupt the recording session. Flow can automatically resume after brief interruptions depending on your background recording timer setting (Settings → Disable Flow Session). Options are: Never, 1 hour, 15 min, 5 min (default), and Immediately.

  • Use Wi-Fi when possible: Flow uses less audio compression on Wi-Fi than on cellular, which can improve transcription quality.

  • Disable Low Data Mode: If you have Low Data Mode enabled in Flow settings, audio uses compressed format even on Wi-Fi. Disable it for best transcription quality on a reliable Wi-Fi connection.

Common issues

Bugs fixed in recent updates

Several issues related to audio loss during connection drops have been fixed:

  • Missing or duplicated text during active dictation: Transcription progress was not being tracked correctly, which could cause words to be missed or repeated.

  • Audio lost when transcription fails: Audio recordings were previously lost when a transcription failed. Now, audio is saved to your history so you can retry later.

  • Audio lost when connection drops mid-dictation: Audio recordings could be lost or mishandled when a connection dropped while the transcription was still streaming.

  • Wrong file shown in history: Retrying a failed connection mid-dictation caused missing or incorrect audio files.

  • Transcript disappearing from history even when deletion failed: A deleted transcript could vanish from the History screen before the deletion actually completed, even if it ultimately failed. Now, a transcript is only removed from the list after the deletion succeeds.

To resolve, update Wispr Flow to the latest version.

Still stuck?

Reach out to our support team if:

  • Retrying from history doesn't recover your transcription

  • This happens consistently even on a stable connection

  • You're on the latest version and still see missing or incorrect audio files

Include your iOS version, device model, and what you've already tried so we can help quickly.