diff --git a/src/whispercpp-transcribe.test.ts b/src/whispercpp-transcribe.test.ts
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..31a3132
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/whispercpp-transcribe.test.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,99 @@
+import { test, expect } from 'bun:test'
+import { mkdtemp, rm } from 'node:fs/promises'
+import { tmpdir } from 'node:os'
+import path from 'node:path'
+import { downloadWhisperModelFile } from './whispercpp-transcribe'
+
+async function createTempDir() {
+	const dir = await mkdtemp(path.join(tmpdir(), 'whisper-model-'))
+	return {
+		path: dir,
+		async [Symbol.asyncDispose]() {
+			await rm(dir, { recursive: true, force: true })
+		},
+	}
+}
+
+test('downloadWhisperModelFile retries rate-limited model downloads', async () => {
+	await using tempDir = await createTempDir()
+	const modelPath = path.join(tempDir.path, 'model.bin')
+	const delays: number[] = []
+	let calls = 0
+	const fetchModel = async () => {
+		calls++
+		if (calls === 1) {
+			return new Response('rate limited', {
+				status: 429,
+				statusText: 'Too Many Requests',
+				headers: { 'retry-after': '1' },
+			})
+		}
+		return new Response('model bytes')
+	}
+
+	await downloadWhisperModelFile(modelPath, {
+		attemptCount: 2,
+		fetch: fetchModel,
+		sleep: async (delayMs) => {
+			delays.push(delayMs)
+		},
+	})
+
+	expect(calls).toBe(2)
+	expect(delays).toEqual([1000])
+	expect(await Bun.file(modelPath).text()).toBe('model bytes')
+})
+
+test('downloadWhisperModelFile retries interrupted model downloads', async () => {
+	await using tempDir = await createTempDir()
+	const modelPath = path.join(tempDir.path, 'model.bin')
+	const delays: number[] = []
+	let calls = 0
+	const fetchModel = async () => {
+		calls++
+		if (calls === 1) {
+			const response = new Response('partial model bytes')
+			response.arrayBuffer = async () => {
+				throw new TypeError('body interrupted')
+			}
+			return response
+		}
+		return new Response('model bytes')
+	}
+
+	await downloadWhisperModelFile(modelPath, {
+		attemptCount: 2,
+		fetch: fetchModel,
+		sleep: async (delayMs) => {
+			delays.push(delayMs)
+		},
+	})
+
+	expect(calls).toBe(2)
+	expect(delays).toEqual([5000])
+	expect(await Bun.file(modelPath).text()).toBe('model bytes')
+})
+
+test('downloadWhisperModelFile does not retry permanent download failures', async () => {
+	await using tempDir = await createTempDir()
+	const modelPath = path.join(tempDir.path, 'model.bin')
+	let calls = 0
+	const fetchModel = async () => {
+		calls++
+		return new Response('missing', {
+			status: 404,
+			statusText: 'Not Found',
+		})
+	}
+
+	await expect(
+		downloadWhisperModelFile(modelPath, {
+			attemptCount: 3,
+			fetch: fetchModel,
+			sleep: async () => {},
+		}),
+	).rejects.toThrow('404 Not Found')
+
+	expect(calls).toBe(1)
+	expect(await Bun.file(modelPath).exists()).toBe(false)
+})
diff --git a/src/whispercpp-transcribe.ts b/src/whispercpp-transcribe.ts
index 70155d7..bdf9ddb 100644
--- a/src/whispercpp-transcribe.ts
+++ b/src/whispercpp-transcribe.ts
@@ -8,6 +8,10 @@ const DEFAULT_MODEL_URL =
 	'https://huggingface.co/ggerganov/whisper.cpp/resolve/main/ggml-small.en.bin'
 const DEFAULT_LANGUAGE = 'en'
 const DEFAULT_BINARY = 'whisper-cli'
+const MODEL_DOWNLOAD_ATTEMPTS = 8
+const MODEL_DOWNLOAD_TIMEOUT_MS = 120_000
+const MODEL_DOWNLOAD_INITIAL_RETRY_DELAY_MS = 5_000
+const MODEL_DOWNLOAD_MAX_RETRY_DELAY_MS = 60_000
 
 type TranscribeOptions = {
 	modelPath?: string
@@ -18,6 +22,24 @@ type TranscribeOptions = {
 	progress?: StepProgressReporter
 }
 
+type ModelDownloadOptions = {
+	progress?: StepProgressReporter
+	fetch?: (url: string, init?: RequestInit) => Promise<Response>
+	sleep?: (delayMs: number) => Promise<void>
+	attemptCount?: number
+}
+
+class ModelDownloadHttpError extends Error {
+	constructor(
+		readonly status: number,
+		readonly statusText: string,
+		readonly retryAfter: string | null,
+	) {
+		super(`Failed to download whisper.cpp model (${status} ${statusText}).`)
+		this.name = 'ModelDownloadHttpError'
+	}
+}
+
 export type TranscriptSegment = {
 	start: number
 	end: number
@@ -101,19 +123,102 @@ async function ensureModelFile(
 		throw new Error(`Whisper model not found at ${modelPath}.`)
 	}
 
-	progress?.setLabel('Downloading model')
+	await downloadWhisperModelFile(modelPath, { progress })
+}
+
+export async function downloadWhisperModelFile(
+	modelPath: string,
+	options: ModelDownloadOptions = {},
+) {
+	options.progress?.setLabel('Downloading model')
 	await mkdir(path.dirname(modelPath), { recursive: true })
-	const response = await fetch(DEFAULT_MODEL_URL)
-	if (!response.ok) {
-		throw new Error(
-			`Failed to download whisper.cpp model (${response.status} ${response.statusText}).`,
-		)
-	}
 
-	const bytes = await response.arrayBuffer()
+	const bytes = await fetchModelBytes(options)
 	await Bun.write(modelPath, bytes)
 }
 
+async function fetchModelBytes(options: ModelDownloadOptions) {
+	const fetcher = options.fetch ?? fetch
+	const sleep = options.sleep ?? Bun.sleep
+	const attemptCount = Math.max(
+		1,
+		Math.floor(options.attemptCount ?? MODEL_DOWNLOAD_ATTEMPTS),
+	)
+	let lastError: unknown
+
+	for (let attempt = 1; attempt <= attemptCount; attempt++) {
+		try {
+			const response = await fetcher(DEFAULT_MODEL_URL, {
+				signal: AbortSignal.timeout(MODEL_DOWNLOAD_TIMEOUT_MS),
+			})
+			if (!response.ok) {
+				throw new ModelDownloadHttpError(
+					response.status,
+					response.statusText,
+					response.headers.get('retry-after'),
+				)
+			}
+			return await response.arrayBuffer()
+		} catch (error) {
+			lastError = error
+			if (!shouldRetryModelDownload(error) || attempt === attemptCount) {
+				break
+			}
+			await sleep(getModelDownloadRetryDelayMs(error, attempt))
+		}
+	}
+
+	if (lastError instanceof Error) {
+		throw lastError
+	}
+	throw new Error('Failed to download whisper.cpp model.')
+}
+
+function shouldRetryModelDownload(error: unknown) {
+	if (!(error instanceof ModelDownloadHttpError)) {
+		return true
+	}
+	return (
+		error.status === 408 ||
+		error.status === 425 ||
+		error.status === 429 ||
+		error.status >= 500
+	)
+}
+
+function getModelDownloadRetryDelayMs(error: unknown, attempt: number) {
+	if (error instanceof ModelDownloadHttpError) {
+		const retryAfterDelayMs = parseRetryAfterDelayMs(error.retryAfter)
+		if (retryAfterDelayMs !== null) {
+			return retryAfterDelayMs
+		}
+	}
+	return Math.min(
+		MODEL_DOWNLOAD_INITIAL_RETRY_DELAY_MS * 2 ** (attempt - 1),
+		MODEL_DOWNLOAD_MAX_RETRY_DELAY_MS,
+	)
+}
+
+function parseRetryAfterDelayMs(retryAfter: string | null) {
+	if (!retryAfter) {
+		return null
+	}
+
+	const seconds = Number(retryAfter)
+	if (Number.isFinite(seconds) && seconds >= 0) {
+		return Math.min(seconds * 1000, MODEL_DOWNLOAD_MAX_RETRY_DELAY_MS)
+	}
+
+	const retryAt = Date.parse(retryAfter)
+	if (Number.isNaN(retryAt)) {
+		return null
+	}
+	return Math.min(
+		Math.max(0, retryAt - Date.now()),
+		MODEL_DOWNLOAD_MAX_RETRY_DELAY_MS,
+	)
+}
+
 async function readTranscriptText(transcriptPath: string, fallback: string) {
 	const transcriptFile = Bun.file(transcriptPath)
 	if (await transcriptFile.exists()) {