Voice mode on Termux (Android): setup guide and fixes

Voice Mode on Termux/Android

Voice mode doesn't work out of the box on Termux due to three issues: no working audio source, key hold detection incompatibility, and release timing too aggressive. Here's how to fix all three.

1. Install dependencies

pkg install sox pulseaudio ffmpeg

2. Fix PulseAudio microphone access

The module-sles-source fails to load because of a missing system library. Symlink it:

ln -sf /system/lib64/libpackagelistparser.so $PREFIX/lib/libpackagelistparser.so

Add to $PREFIX/etc/pulse/default.pa (after the static driver section):

.nofail
load-module module-sles-source
load-module module-sles-sink
.fail

Restart PulseAudio:

pulseaudio -k; pulseaudio --start
pactl set-default-source OpenSL_ES_source

3. Fix push-to-talk key

Termux's extra-keys bar only auto-repeats 6 keys: UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT, BKSP, DEL. Bind push-to-talk to one of these in ~/.claude/keybindings.json:

{
  "bindings": [
    {
      "context": "Chat",
      "bindings": {
        "down": "voice:pushToTalk"
      }
    }
  ]
}

4. Fix release detection timing

The default 200ms release timeout is too fast for Termux's key repeat rate, causing recording to cut out mid-speech. Patch it:

sed -i 's/tK7=200,KVz=600/tK7=0,KVz=0/' $PREFIX/lib/node_modules/@anthropic-ai/claude-code/cli.js

Note: This patch must be re-applied after each Claude Code update.

5. Grant microphone permission

termux-microphone-record -f /tmp/test.wav -l 1

Tap Allow on the Android permission dialog.

Usage

Run /voice in Claude Code, then hold the DOWN arrow on the Termux extra-keys bar to record.

Feature request

It would be great if Claude Code supported:

• A configurable release detection timeout (e.g. voiceReleaseTimeoutMs in settings.json) so Termux users don't need to patch cli.js
• A toggle-to-talk mode (voice:toggleRecord) as an alternative to push-to-talk, since many mobile/terminal environments lack reliable key hold detection

Environment: Termux on Android (Samsung Galaxy, aarch64), Claude Code 2.1.86

🤖 Generated with Claude Code