Quality control for WordPress audio publishingDocumentation
Troubleshooting: Dead air
Explain how silence detection works and what editors should review before publishing.
What `dead air` means
AudioLinter uses dead air findings to point out stretches of silence or near-silence that may be longer than listeners expect. Sometimes this is a real publishing problem. Sometimes it is intentional pacing.
Not every silence segment is wrong
A dead air warning does not automatically mean the file is broken. Some formats deliberately leave short pauses between sections. The goal is to prompt editorial review, not to remove every moment of silence blindly.
What editors should check
- Listen to the flagged section and decide whether the pause sounds intentional.
- Check whether the silence comes from a bad edit, missing clip or accidental long gap.
- Review the beginning and end of the file, because dead air often hides there.
When to repair automatically
If dead air is part of a broader quality problem, the repair workflow may still be a reasonable first step. But when the issue is clearly a bad edit decision, manual cleanup in an editor is often more precise.
Manual cleanup advice
In Audacity or another editor, zoom into the flagged range and verify the transition before deleting anything. Abruptly removing silence can make speech sound rushed or unnatural, so keep the pacing of the piece in mind.