diff --git a/README.rst b/README.rst
index 965bd46a..8cc893c6 100644
--- a/README.rst
+++ b/README.rst
@@ -118,11 +118,11 @@ If not installed, everything in the library will still work, except attempting t
 
 The installation instructions on the PyAudio website are quite good - for convenience, they are summarized below:
 
-* On Windows, install PyAudio using `Pip <https://pip.readthedocs.org/>`__: execute ``pip install pyaudio`` in a terminal.
+* On Windows, install with PyAudio using `Pip <https://pip.readthedocs.org/>`__: execute ``pip install SpeechRecognition[audio]`` in a terminal.
 * On Debian-derived Linux distributions (like Ubuntu and Mint), install PyAudio using `APT <https://wiki.debian.org/Apt>`__: execute ``sudo apt-get install python-pyaudio python3-pyaudio`` in a terminal.
-    * If the version in the repositories is too old, install the latest release using Pip: execute ``sudo apt-get install portaudio19-dev python-all-dev python3-all-dev && sudo pip install pyaudio`` (replace ``pip`` with ``pip3`` if using Python 3).
-* On OS X, install PortAudio using `Homebrew <http://brew.sh/>`__: ``brew install portaudio``. Then, install PyAudio using `Pip <https://pip.readthedocs.org/>`__: ``pip install pyaudio``.
-* On other POSIX-based systems, install the ``portaudio19-dev`` and ``python-all-dev`` (or ``python3-all-dev`` if using Python 3) packages (or their closest equivalents) using a package manager of your choice, and then install PyAudio using `Pip <https://pip.readthedocs.org/>`__: ``pip install pyaudio`` (replace ``pip`` with ``pip3`` if using Python 3).
+    * If the version in the repositories is too old, install the latest release using Pip: execute ``sudo apt-get install portaudio19-dev python-all-dev python3-all-dev && sudo pip install SpeechRecognition[audio]`` (replace ``pip`` with ``pip3`` if using Python 3).
+* On OS X, install PortAudio using `Homebrew <http://brew.sh/>`__: ``brew install portaudio``. Then, install with PyAudio using `Pip <https://pip.readthedocs.org/>`__: ``pip install SpeechRecognition[audio]``.
+* On other POSIX-based systems, install the ``portaudio19-dev`` and ``python-all-dev`` (or ``python3-all-dev`` if using Python 3) packages (or their closest equivalents) using a package manager of your choice, and then install with PyAudio using `Pip <https://pip.readthedocs.org/>`__: ``pip install SpeechRecognition[audio]`` (replace ``pip`` with ``pip3`` if using Python 3).
 
 PyAudio `wheel packages <https://pypi.python.org/pypi/wheel>`__ for common 64-bit Python versions on Windows and Linux are included for convenience, under the ``third-party/`` `directory <https://github.com/Uberi/speech_recognition/tree/master/third-party>`__ in the repository root. To install, simply run ``pip install wheel`` followed by ``pip install ./third-party/WHEEL_FILENAME`` (replace ``pip`` with ``pip3`` if using Python 3) in the repository `root directory <https://github.com/Uberi/speech_recognition>`__.
 
diff --git a/reference/library-reference.rst b/reference/library-reference.rst
index 0aa7a8ce..e8b6c7e0 100644
--- a/reference/library-reference.rst
+++ b/reference/library-reference.rst
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ Speech Recognition Library Reference
 
 Creates a new ``Microphone`` instance, which represents a physical microphone on the computer. Subclass of ``AudioSource``.
 
-This will throw an ``AttributeError`` if you don't have PyAudio 0.2.11 or later installed.
+This will throw an ``AttributeError`` if you don't have PyAudio (0.2.11 or later) installed.
 
 If ``device_index`` is unspecified or ``None``, the default microphone is used as the audio source. Otherwise, ``device_index`` should be the index of the device to use for audio input.
 
diff --git a/setup.cfg b/setup.cfg
index c5c47909..659471f2 100644
--- a/setup.cfg
+++ b/setup.cfg
@@ -7,6 +7,8 @@ universal=1
 dev =
     flake8
     rstcheck
+audio =
+    PyAudio >= 0.2.11
 whisper-local =
     openai-whisper
     soundfile
diff --git a/speech_recognition/__init__.py b/speech_recognition/__init__.py
index dc1bce5c..8261c274 100644
--- a/speech_recognition/__init__.py
+++ b/speech_recognition/__init__.py
@@ -59,7 +59,7 @@ class Microphone(AudioSource):
     """
     Creates a new ``Microphone`` instance, which represents a physical microphone on the computer. Subclass of ``AudioSource``.
 
-    This will throw an ``AttributeError`` if you don't have PyAudio 0.2.11 or later installed.
+    This will throw an ``AttributeError`` if you don't have PyAudio (0.2.11 or later) installed.
 
     If ``device_index`` is unspecified or ``None``, the default microphone is used as the audio source. Otherwise, ``device_index`` should be the index of the device to use for audio input.
 
@@ -108,9 +108,6 @@ def get_pyaudio():
             import pyaudio
         except ImportError:
             raise AttributeError("Could not find PyAudio; check installation")
-        from distutils.version import LooseVersion
-        if LooseVersion(pyaudio.__version__) < LooseVersion("0.2.11"):
-            raise AttributeError("PyAudio 0.2.11 or later is required (found version {})".format(pyaudio.__version__))
         return pyaudio
 
     @staticmethod