Trim audio
Pull the thirty seconds that matter out of a forty-minute recording: give a start point and how many seconds to keep, and only that clip comes back, cut cleanly without clicks. Pay per use, no subscription.
This task is not available right now, so it cannot be purchased. Nothing is charged for it.
How it works & APIThe good part of a recording is usually thirty seconds buried inside forty minutes, and dragging a waveform in an editor to find it is the slow way to get there.
Send the clip, not the container
The good part of a recording is usually thirty seconds buried inside forty minutes. A board meeting holds one decision worth quoting, a two-hour podcast one clip worth sharing, a customer call one moment of feedback worth keeping. Sending the whole file every time forces whoever receives it to repeat the search you already did. Trimming fixes that: you give a start point and how many seconds to keep, and only that window comes back, ready to share or to pass to the next step.
A clean cut, and what usually comes next
Cutting sounds simple, and conceptually it is: pick a start, pick an end, keep what is between. But cutting a compressed audio stream at arbitrary points can introduce clicks or misaligned frames, which every audio engineer learns the first time a hard cut pops. Here the cut is handled so the clip starts and stops where you asked. Trimming is often the first step before a clip is normalised, cleaned of noise or converted for delivery, and also the way to drop a long musical intro before transcription. The finished clip waits through a secure link for 24 hours.
The forty minutes nobody needed
A full board meeting recording contains one decision worth quoting, a two-hour podcast contains one clip worth sharing on social, a customer call contains one moment of feedback worth pulling for a highlight reel. Shipping the entire file every time forces whoever receives it to do the searching you already did. audio.trim exists so that the clip, not the container, is what travels.
Precision without re-encoding artifacts
Trimming sounds simple, and conceptually it is: pick a start, pick an end, keep what's between them. But naive cutting at arbitrary points in a compressed audio stream can introduce clicks or misaligned frames if it isn't done carefully, which is a lesson every audio engineer learns the first time a hard cut pops instead of ending clean.
What you can do with it
Highlight clip from a podcast episode
A show extracts the most quotable thirty seconds from a full episode to post as a teaser on social media.
Evidence excerpt from a call recording
A support team pulls the exact segment of a customer call where a commitment was made, without sharing the entire conversation.
Ringtone or notification sound
A mobile app trims a short signature sound out of a longer musical track to use as a custom notification tone.
Removing a long intro before further processing
A transcription pipeline trims off a lengthy musical intro before sending the spoken portion of a file downstream.
FAQ
Does trimming lose audio quality?
The cut points are handled cleanly so the resulting clip doesn't introduce clicks or artifacts beyond whatever compression the source format already applied.
Is my audio kept after trimming?
No, source files and results are deleted after the retention window and are never used for training.
How do I tell it which part of the audio to keep?
Give a start point in seconds and how many seconds to keep from there. Everything outside that window is left behind, and the clip comes back through a secure link that stays valid for 24 hours.
Will the trimmed clip click or pop at the edges?
It should not. Cutting compressed audio blindly at arbitrary points can cause clicks or misaligned frames, so the cut is handled carefully and the clip starts and stops exactly where you asked.
Can trimming be the first step before other edits?
Yes, that is its most common role. Trim the window first, then normalise, remove noise or convert the clip for delivery, with each step starting as soon as the previous one finishes.
Related tools
For developers — API access
Everything on this page is available programmatically. This section is for teams who want to wire it into their own systems; everyone else can just use the tool above.
API endpoint
One authenticated POST creates the task; the result comes back by webhook or a signed link. This capability is currently available through the API, not as an interactive Web tool.
Call it from your stack
curl -X POST https://api.kit.forhosting.com/audio/trim \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $KIT_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"audio":"https://example.com/clip.mp3","start":10,"duration":30}'const res = await fetch("https://api.kit.forhosting.com/audio/trim", {
method: "POST",
headers: {
"Authorization": `Bearer ${process.env.KIT_KEY}`,
"Content-Type": "application/json"
},
body: JSON.stringify({
"audio": "https://example.com/clip.mp3",
"start": 10,
"duration": 30
})
});
const { task_id } = await res.json();import os, requests
res = requests.post(
"https://api.kit.forhosting.com/audio/trim",
headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['KIT_KEY']}"},
json={
"audio": "https://example.com/clip.mp3",
"start": 10,
"duration": 30
},
)
task_id = res.json()["task_id"]<?php
$res = file_get_contents("https://api.kit.forhosting.com/audio/trim", false, stream_context_create([
"http" => [
"method" => "POST",
"header" => "Authorization: Bearer " . getenv("KIT_KEY") . "\r\nContent-Type: application/json",
"content" => '{"audio":"https://example.com/clip.mp3","start":10,"duration":30}',
],
]));
$task = json_decode($res, true);body := bytes.NewBufferString(`{"audio":"https://example.com/clip.mp3","start":10,"duration":30}`)
req, _ := http.NewRequest("POST", "https://api.kit.forhosting.com/audio/trim", body)
req.Header.Set("Authorization", "Bearer "+os.Getenv("KIT_KEY"))
req.Header.Set("Content-Type", "application/json")
res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)Example request
{
"audio": "https://example.com/clip.mp3",
"start": 10,
"duration": 30
}Example response
{
"task_id": "tsk_a1b2c3d4e5f6a1b2c3d4e5f6",
"type": "audio.trim",
"status": "queued",
"_links": {
"result": "/tasks/tsk_…/result"
}
}The API is asynchronous: the call returns a task_id immediately and the result arrives by webhook. Polling is capped at 1 req/s per task.
Pricing
Published price — no tokens, no invented credits. A failed task is never charged.
Limits
max_mb | 200 |
max_minutes | 180 |
Errors
| HTTP | Code | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
401 | unauthorized | Missing or invalid API key. |
402 | insufficient_balance | Your balance doesn't cover the task price. |
404 | unknown_type | That task type doesn't exist. |
429 | rate_limited | Too many requests. Use the webhook instead of polling. |
Technical notes
This endpoint cuts the exact window you specify and leaves the rest behind.
How the cut is made
POST /audio/trim with the source file and a start and end point, and the task runs asynchronously, returning a task_id right away. Once the trim completes, you get the resulting clip through a signed webhook call or a signed link that stays valid for 24 hours — plenty of time for a job queue or a person to come collect it.
Precision without re-encoding artifacts
The endpoint handles the cut properly so the output starts and stops where you asked, without the artifacts that come from cutting blind.
Fitting into a larger editing pipeline
Trim rarely runs alone — it's usually the first step before a clip gets normalized, denoised or converted to a delivery format, and running it as its own async task means each step in that chain can be triggered independently as soon as the previous one's webhook fires. Because pricing is per request plus per minute of the source file, extracting a ten-second highlight from a ninety-minute recording costs close to nothing beyond the base request fee, which makes clipping at scale genuinely practical rather than a manual chore reserved for the highlights someone remembers to make. A media team that used to assign an intern to scrub through recordings looking for quotable moments can instead script the search and let this endpoint handle the actual cutting, keeping a human in charge of judgment and out of the business of dragging playheads.
Technical questions
How do I trim audio with the API?
POST the file and the start and end times to /audio/trim, keep the returned task_id, and get the clip by webhook or a signed link valid for 24 hours.
Is the audio trimmer API free?
No, there is no free tier or trial; it costs $0.077 per request plus $0.0045 per minute of the source audio, and a failed trim is never charged.
What audio formats can I trim?
The common ones — MP3, WAV, OGG, M4A and FLAC — check the endpoint reference for the current full list.
Can I extract more than one clip from the same file?
Yes, submit a separate trim task for each segment you want, and each one returns its own task_id and result independently.
Is this endpoint live yet?
It's in deployment now and not yet accepting jobs; check the endpoint status page before pointing production traffic at it.
How precise can the start and end points be?
Precise enough for clip editing and highlight extraction; consult the endpoint reference for the exact time resolution it accepts.