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Participant
March 28, 2024

Delete Silence tool detection is wrong when long duration of audio is selected or >500 segments

  • March 28, 2024
  • 3 replies
  • 114 views

To reproduce:

  • Open "Delete Silence" tool and select some sane thresholds
  • Select ~60 min or longer of audio and click "Scan"

Detected silence segments include long sections of audio, as if the thresholds were invisibly changed. The number of segments detected is also much smaller than it should be.

If you reduce the audio selection slowly (e.g. from 60min to 50min, then 40min, 30min, etc.) and scan at every duration, at some point, it will start working correctly again. Number of segments detected goes from something like 26 to 498 when I shorten the duration from 34min to 33min. This makes no sense, because it longer duration must have more segments.

From the behavior, it seems like when more than 500 segments of silence are present, it gives the wrong result.

3 replies

masonreed
Participating Frequently
July 27, 2026

It does sound like a bug. The sudden drop in detected silence segments with longer selections suggests the tool may be hitting an internal limit rather than processing the audio correctly. I'd recommend reporting the Audacity version, OS, and a sample file if possible, as that should help the developers reproduce and investigate the issue.

davidwarner11t
Participating Frequently
July 20, 2026

This looks like a bug. The sudden drop in detected silence on longer selections suggests the tool is hitting an internal limit. I'd report it with your sample audio and settings so the developers can reproduce it.

JohnRael
Known Participant
July 18, 2026

I’m currently experiencing this (2026-07-18)