warbleR

Is intended to facilitate the analysis of the structure of animal acoustic signals in R.
https://github.com/marce10/warbler

Category: Biosphere
Sub Category: Bioacoustics and Acoustic Data Analysis

Keywords

animal-acoustic-signals audio-processing bioacoustics spectrogram streamline-analysis

Keywords from Contributors

behavior acoustic-signals animal compendium birdsong cultural-evolution phylogenetics

Last synced: about 12 hours ago
JSON representation

Repository metadata

streamline acoustic analysis in R

• Host: GitHub
• URL: https://github.com/marce10/warbler
• Owner: maRce10
• License: gpl-3.0
• Created: 2015-07-09T16:49:10.000Z (over 11 years ago)
• Default Branch: master
• Last Pushed: 2026-10-02T15:23:34.000Z (23 days ago)
• Last Synced: 2026-10-24T05:34:38.917Z (1 day ago)
• Topics: animal-acoustic-signals, audio-processing, bioacoustics, spectrogram, streamline-analysis
• Language: R
• Homepage: https://marce10.github.io/warbleR/
• Size: 181 MB
• Stars: 63
• Watchers: 10
• Forks: 21
• Open Issues: 24
• Releases: 1
• Metadata Files:
  • Readme: README.Rmd
  • Changelog: NEWS.md
  • Contributing: CONTRIBUTING.md
  • License: LICENSE.md
  • Codemeta: codemeta.json

README.Rmd

          ---
title: "warbleR: Streamline Bioacoustic Analysis"
output: github_document
editor_options: 
  chunk_output_type: console
---




[![CRAN status](https://www.r-pkg.org/badges/version/warbleR)](https://cran.r-project.org/package=warbleR)
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[![License: GPL v3](https://img.shields.io/badge/License-GPLv3-blue.svg)](https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0)
[![Paper DOI](https://img.shields.io/badge/DOI-10.1111%2F2041--210X.12624-1f6feb.svg)](https://doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12624)




**warbleR** is an R package for analyzing the structure of animal acoustic signals at scale. Bring your own recordings (or open-access ones from repositories like [Xeno-canto](https://xeno-canto.org/), easily obtained with [suwo](https://docs.ropensci.org/suwo/)), annotate them in a *selection table*, and run the whole pipeline — from file wrangling and spectrograms to acoustic measurements and similarity analyses — in batch, on as many signals as you have.

Built on top of [seewave](https://cran.r-project.org/package=seewave) and [tuneR](https://cran.r-project.org/package=tuneR), warbleR adds the workflow layer those packages leave to the user:

- 🗂️ **Selection-table-driven workflows** — every function loops over the signals listed in an annotation table, so one call handles one sound or ten thousand
- 📦 **Extended selection tables** — a single R object that bundles annotations *and* the audio clips, making analyses portable and easy to share
- ⚡ **Parallel processing** — most functions take a `parallel` argument to spread the work across cores
- 🔍 **Built-in quality checks** — spectrogram images and diagnostic tools let you verify each step before moving on

## What can you do with it?

| Task | Key functions |
|:-----|:--------------|
| Inspect, convert and fix sound files | `info_sound_files()`, `check_sound_files()`, `fix_wavs()`, `mp32wav()`, `wav_2_flac()`, `split_sound_files()`, `remove_channels()` |
| Build and validate annotation tables | `selection_table()`, `check_sels()`, `tailor_sels()`, `cut_sels()`, `overlapping_sels()`, `consolidate()` |
| Create spectrograms | `spectrograms()`, `full_spectrograms()`, `color_spectro()`, `snr_spectrograms()`, `catalog()`, `phylo_spectro()` |
| Measure acoustic structure | `spectro_analysis()`, `mfcc_stats()`, `song_analysis()`, `freq_range()`, `sig2noise()`, `sound_pressure_level()`, `gaps()`, `wpd_features()` |
| Track frequency contours | `freq_ts()`, `track_freq_contour()`, `track_harmonic()`, `inflections()` |
| Compare signals | `cross_correlation()`, `freq_DTW()`, `multi_DTW()`, `waveform_similarity()`, `compare_methods()` |
| Analyze duet / chorus coordination | `test_coordination()`, `plot_coordination()` |
| Simulate signals | `simulate_songs()` |

See the [function reference](https://marce10.github.io/warbleR/reference/) for the full list.

## Installation

From CRAN:

```{r, eval = FALSE}
install.packages("warbleR")
```

Development version from GitHub (requires [remotes](https://cran.r-project.org/package=remotes)):

```{r, eval = FALSE}
remotes::install_github("maRce10/warbleR")
```

## Quick example

The example recordings and annotations come from the [NatureSounds](https://cran.r-project.org/package=NatureSounds) package (installed with warbleR):

```{r, eval = FALSE}
library(warbleR)

# load example long-billed hermit songs and their annotations
data(list = c("Phae.long1", "Phae.long2", "Phae.long3", "Phae.long4", "lbh_selec_table"))

# save the sound files to a temporary folder
for (i in paste0("Phae.long", 1:4)) {
  tuneR::writeWave(get(i), file.path(tempdir(), paste0(i, ".wav")))
}

# check that annotations and sound files match
check_sels(lbh_selec_table, path = tempdir())

# measure spectral and temporal parameters for every annotated signal
params <- spectro_analysis(lbh_selec_table, path = tempdir())

# pairwise acoustic similarity via spectrographic cross-correlation
xc <- cross_correlation(lbh_selec_table, path = tempdir())
```

## Learn more

- 📘 [Intro to warbleR](https://marce10.github.io/warbleR/articles/a_warbleR.html) — an overview of the package
- 📝 [Annotation data format](https://marce10.github.io/warbleR/articles/b_annotation_data_format.html) — how input annotations (selection tables) should look
- 🔁 [All vignettes](https://marce10.github.io/warbleR/articles/) — worked examples of complete analysis workflows
- 📄 [Original paper](https://doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12624) in *Methods in Ecology and Evolution* (the package has grown a lot since, so check the vignettes for current usage)

## Related packages

| Package | What it does |
|:--------|:-------------|
| [seewave](https://cran.r-project.org/package=seewave) & [tuneR](https://cran.r-project.org/package=tuneR) | Core sound analysis and manipulation of wave objects in R |
| [ohun](https://docs.ropensci.org/ohun/) | Automated detection of sound events, with tools to diagnose and optimize detection routines |
| [suwo](https://docs.ropensci.org/suwo/) | Search, download and map nature media (Xeno-canto, Macaulay Library, iNaturalist, GBIF, WikiAves) — replaces warbleR's `query_xc()` and `map_xc()` |
| [baRulho](https://docs.ropensci.org/baRulho/) | Quantifying habitat-induced degradation of acoustic signals, with inputs/outputs compatible with warbleR |
| [Rraven](https://cran.r-project.org/package=Rraven) | Data exchange between R and [Raven](https://www.ravensoundsoftware.com/) (Cornell Lab of Ornithology), handy for using Raven as the annotation tool |
| [dynaSpec](https://cran.r-project.org/package=dynaSpec) | Dynamic spectrograms (spectrogram videos) |
| [NatureSounds](https://cran.r-project.org/package=NatureSounds) | Example recordings and annotations of animal sounds |

## Getting help & contributing

Found a bug or have a feature request? Please open an [issue](https://github.com/maRce10/warbleR/issues). Contributions are welcome — see the [contributing guidelines](https://github.com/maRce10/warbleR/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md).

## Citation

If you use warbleR, please cite:

> Araya-Salas, M. & Smith-Vidaurre, G. (2017). warbleR: an R package to streamline analysis of animal acoustic signals. *Methods in Ecology and Evolution*, 8, 184–191. 

Please also cite [tuneR](https://cran.r-project.org/package=tuneR) and [seewave](https://cran.r-project.org/package=seewave) if you use any function that creates spectrograms or measures acoustic parameters. You can get all citations from R with `citation("warbleR")`.

        

---

Owner metadata

• Name: Marcelo Araya-Salas
• Login: maRce10
• Email: marcelo.araya@ucr.ac.cr
• Kind: user
• Description: I am an evolutionary behavioral ecologist and scientific programmer/software developer 🇨🇷
• Website: https://marce10.github.io/
• Location: Costa Rica
• Twitter:
• Company: Universidad de Costa Rica
• Icon url: https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/13245502?u=17be1a4bcfcaf078564005f67571aa5fb5b82d7e&v=4
• Repositories: 58
• Last ynced at: 2026-10-24T05:34:38.965Z
• Profile URL: https://github.com/maRce10

---

GitHub Events

Total

• Fork event: 1
• Issue comment event: 7
• Issues event: 2
• Pull request event: 1
• Push event: 39
• Watch event: 6

Last Year

• Push event: 2

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Committers metadata

Last synced: 1 day ago

Name	Email	Commits
maRce10	m****7@g****m	632
Marcelo Araya-Salas	m****a@u****r	211
gsmithvi	g****i@g****m	49
maRce10	m****7@g****m	2
Open AI Tx	o****x@o****m	1
Ed Baker	e****r@g****m	1
Andrew S	a****e@g****m	1
Grace Smith Vidaurre	g****e@M****l	1

Committer domains:

• ucr.ac.cr: 1

---

Issue and Pull Request metadata

Last synced: 1 day ago

More stats: https://issues.ecosyste.ms/repositories/lookup?url=https://github.com/marce10/warbler

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Package metadata

• Total packages: 1
• Total downloads:
  • cran: 1,340 last-month
• Total dependent packages: 3
• Total dependent repositories: 6
• Total versions: 40
• Total maintainers: 1

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Dependencies

Score: 13.753209531766895