# How to pick the best sound from a pile of downloads with earshot

Repo: [Leonxlnx/earshot](https://github.com/Leonxlnx/earshot) | Difficulty: Intermediate | Time: 45 minutes | Basis: Seen in the wild

Rank candidate files against a text description and trim the best moment from a long recording.

**Who it is for:** Game or video maker who downloaded several candidate sound effects and needs to pick one

**The problem:** Choosing among many similar files by ear is slow, and long recordings hide the one good hit.

**The outcome:** A ranked list of files for your description, plus start and end seconds for the best moment in a long file.

## Steps

1. Run `earshot rank QUERY PATHS...` with a text description and your candidate files.
2. Run `earshot find keys.ogg "a single mechanical key press" --top 4` on a long file to get trim points.
3. Check a top pick with `earshot match key.ogg "a deep thocky mechanical keyboard press" --alts "a clicky blue switch keyboard" "a mouse click"`.
4. Trim the file at the returned start and end seconds.

## Prompt to paste into your agent

```text
Use earshot rank to order the files in <folder> by <description>, then run earshot find on the top file to give me trim start and end seconds. Verify the top pick with earshot match against two alternative descriptions.
```

## Caveat

Matching quality depends on the built-in vocabulary of 322 descriptions, so unusual sounds may rank loosely.

## Seen in the wild

- X (Oct 2026): https://x.com/i/web/status/2112336745945788688

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URL: https://dedupedai.com/use-cases/leonxlnx-earshot/rank-downloaded-sounds-by-description/