This page is intended to document how to install audio backends and provides troubleshooting steps for your audio loading troubles.

SpeechBrain now uses soundfile as the sole supported audio I/O backend through the :mod:`speechbrain.dataio.audio_io` module.

The soundfile backend supports most common audio formats including: wav, flac, and mp3. For advanced format support or issues, please refer to the sections below.

The pip package soundfile is a dependency of SpeechBrain and should be automatically installed when you install SpeechBrain. Starting with SoundFile 0.12.0, the pip package bundles a prebuilt libsndfile for most platforms (Windows, macOS, Linux), so it typically works out of the box when installed via pip.

If you encounter issues with audio loading:

• Update soundfile: Try running pip install --upgrade soundfile to get the latest version with updated libsndfile binaries.

• On Linux with superuser rights: Install libsndfile through your distribution's package manager (e.g., sudo apt install libsndfile1 on Ubuntu/Debian).

• For advanced codec support: If you need to work with formats not supported by soundfile (e.g., AAC/M4A), you may need to convert your audio files to a supported format like WAV or FLAC using external tools such as ffmpeg.

• Check installation: You can verify soundfile is working by running:

  import soundfile as sf
  print(sf.__version__)
  print(sf.available_formats())

SpeechBrain provides its own audio I/O interface through the :mod:`speechbrain.dataio.audio_io` module. Usage example:

from speechbrain.dataio import audio_io

# Load audio file
audio, sample_rate = audio_io.load("path/to/audio.wav")

# Get audio metadata
info = audio_io.info("path/to/audio.wav")
print(info.sample_rate, info.duration, info.channels)

# Save audio file
audio_io.save("output.wav", audio, sample_rate)

This API is compatible with the previous torchaudio-based interface, making migration straightforward.