Deepgram Hello World

Overview

Minimal working example demonstrating core Deepgram speech-to-text functionality.

Prerequisites

• Completed deepgram-install-auth setup
• Valid API credentials configured
• Audio file for transcription (or use URL)

Instructions

Step 1: Create Entry File

Create a new file for your hello world example.

Step 2: Import and Initialize Client

import { createClient } from '@deepgram/sdk';

const deepgram = createClient(process.env.DEEPGRAM_API_KEY);

Step 3: Transcribe Audio from URL

async function transcribe() {
  const { result, error } = await deepgram.listen.prerecorded.transcribeUrl(
    { url: 'https://static.deepgram.com/examples/nasa-podcast.wav' },
    { model: 'nova-2', smart_format: true }
  );

  if (error) throw error;
  console.log(result.results.channels[0].alternatives[0].transcript);
}

transcribe();

Output

• Working code file with Deepgram client initialization
• Successful transcription response
• Console output showing transcribed text

Error Handling

Error	Cause	Solution
Import Error	SDK not installed	Verify with npm list @deepgram/sdk
Auth Error	Invalid credentials	Check environment variable is set
Audio Format Error	Unsupported format	Use WAV, MP3, FLAC, or OGG
URL Not Accessible	Cannot fetch audio	Ensure URL is publicly accessible

Examples

TypeScript - Transcribe URL

import { createClient } from '@deepgram/sdk';

const deepgram = createClient(process.env.DEEPGRAM_API_KEY);

async function main() {
  const { result, error } = await deepgram.listen.prerecorded.transcribeUrl(
    { url: 'https://static.deepgram.com/examples/nasa-podcast.wav' },
    { model: 'nova-2', smart_format: true }
  );

  if (error) throw error;
  console.log('Transcript:', result.results.channels[0].alternatives[0].transcript);
}

main().catch(console.error);

TypeScript - Transcribe Local File

import { createClient } from '@deepgram/sdk';
import { readFileSync } from 'fs';

const deepgram = createClient(process.env.DEEPGRAM_API_KEY);

async function transcribeFile(filePath: string) {
  const audio = readFileSync(filePath);

  const { result, error } = await deepgram.listen.prerecorded.transcribeFile(
    audio,
    { model: 'nova-2', smart_format: true, mimetype: 'audio/wav' }
  );

  if (error) throw error;
  console.log('Transcript:', result.results.channels[0].alternatives[0].transcript);
}

transcribeFile('./audio.wav');

Python Example

from deepgram import DeepgramClient, PrerecordedOptions
import os

deepgram = DeepgramClient(os.environ.get('DEEPGRAM_API_KEY'))

options = PrerecordedOptions(
    model="nova-2",
    smart_format=True,
)

url = {"url": "https://static.deepgram.com/examples/nasa-podcast.wav"}
response = deepgram.listen.rest.v("1").transcribe_url(url, options)

print(response.results.channels[0].alternatives[0].transcript)

Resources

• Deepgram Getting Started
• Deepgram API Reference
• Deepgram Models

Next Steps

Proceed to deepgram-local-dev-loop for development workflow setup.