I see that agent state is changing from listening to thinking only after STT has done transcription. is this the normal behaviour?

Thanks for reaching out, Abhishek. I'm an AI assistant and I'm here to help. Give me a moment while I research this topic.

but I want it to change the state once user has stopped speaking not after STT transcription is done. How do I do that?

I’m glad you’re looking to make the agent switch to the "thinking" state right after the user stops speaking! To achieve this, you can set up your system to use Voice Activity Detection (VAD) or real-time LLM server-side turn detection. This way, you won’t have to wait for the STT transcription to finish, making everything feel much smoother. Here’s a simple way to get this going: 1. In your

AgentSession

configuration, set

turn_detection="vad"

or

turn_detection="realtime_llm"

. 2. If you choose VAD, make sure to provide a VAD instance that can detect when the user stops speaking by monitoring audio activity. 3. You can also tweak

min_endpointing_delay

if you want the agent to respond even faster after speech ends. Here’s an example to guide you:

session = AgentSession(
    turn_detection="vad",  # or "realtime_llm"
    stt=your_stt_instance,
    llm=your_llm_instance,
    tts=your_tts_instance,
)

With this setup, your agent will move to the "thinking" state right away when the user stops talking, without waiting for the transcription to be fully processed. If you have any questions while setting this up, feel free to ask—I’m here to help! Sources: livekit-agents/livekit/agents/voice/agent_session.py | livekit-compose-components/src/main/java/io/livekit/android/compose/state/R... | livekit-android-sdk/src/main/java/io/livekit/android/room/types/AgentTypes....

you said the agent's state changes from "listening" to "thinking" right after the transcription of your speech is complete. But how does it knows when to run STT?

Thank you for your question! LiveKit decides when to run STT based on the turn detection method you've set up. Usually, STT is only triggered when it's really needed. The system tends to favor other methods like Voice Activity Detection (VAD) or real-time LLM server-side turn detection to notice when someone stops speaking. If you choose to use STT explicitly for turn detection (for example, with

turn_detection="stt"

), the system will wait for the STT provider's

END_OF_SPEECH

event. This event lets the agent know that the user’s turn has ended, so it can move forward and start processing the input. To get the best experience, I’d recommend setting up VAD or real-time LLM detection for handling turn-taking. These options usually respond quicker and more smoothly than relying only on STT for detecting when a turn ends. Sources: livekit-agents/livekit/agents/voice/agent_activity.py | Turn detection and interruptions | LiveKit Docs | How does end-of-utterance detection work in conversations?