Find any teaching by what was said.
Dharma talks from your teachers and retreats, transcribed and searchable word for word, so you can find the teaching you half remember and listen from the moment it was said.
How it works
If you can remember a little of what a teacher said, you can find it again.
- 1
Type what you remember
A phrase, an image, a story the teacher told. It doesn’t need to be exact.
- 2
Read the passage
You see the teacher’s own words, with the talk and the teacher named. Nothing is paraphrased.
- 3
Listen from that moment
Press play and the recording starts right where those words were spoken.
Built on Dharma Seed
For decades, Dharma Seed has freely shared the talks of insight teachers and retreat centers, in the spirit of dana. Insight Index listens to those same recordings, transcribes them, and links every passage back to the original on Dharma Seed.
It doesn’t replace Dharma Seed. It helps you find your way into it. If you teach and want your talks handled differently, or removed, write to me and it is done.
Visit Dharma Seed →Also in Insight Index
Follow your teachers
New talks from the teachers and retreats you follow show up on their own.
A simple sitting timer
It opens with a short passage, rings a bell, and leaves you alone. No streaks.
A note from the maker
I am an insight meditation practitioner and a product manager in the Bay Area. I built this for myself, after one too many retreats where the teachings I had just sat with were suddenly hard to find again. The talks were on Dharma Seed, but I could not search them by what was said, or find the moment I half remembered from Tuesday’s sit.
It has become a real part of my practice. It is a free pilot, shared with a small circle of practitioners, and there is room for a few more.
- Free. There is no business model here that needs your attention or your data.
- Private. No tracking, nothing sold or shared.
- The teachers’ own words. Never summarized, always linked back to the talk.
Start with the talks you already love.
Questions
What is Insight Index?
Insight Index is a tool for insight (Vipassana) meditation practitioners that makes decades of recorded dharma talks searchable by what was said. It offers semantic search, full transcripts, personal libraries, and a way to give dana directly to teachers.
Where does the content come from?
Talks are drawn from freely shared archives including Dharmaseed, Tara Brach’s collection, Insight Meditation Society (IMS), Spirit Rock, and more.
Is it free to use?
Yes. Like the tradition it draws from, Insight Index is offered as a contribution to the community in the spirit of dana — not as a commercial product.
How is my privacy protected?
Privacy is built in from the start: no logging, no telemetry, and no data sold or shared. Your practice history is yours.
Who is it for?
Both sides of the teacher–student relationship: students who want to revisit and stay connected to what they heard on retreat — especially if they didn’t take notes — and teachers and centers who want their talks to be easy to find and return to.
How does semantic search work?
Ask about a topic, an anecdote, or a feeling in plain language, and the app finds the exact moment in the right talk — with a timestamp back to the audio and a full, searchable transcript.