Former US President Joe Biden has withdrawn a lawsuit seeking to block the release of audio recordings and transcripts of interviews he gave to his memoir ghostwriter before becoming president, clearing the way for the material to be handed over to a Republican-led congressional committee.

Biden's lawyers filed a notice on Friday to voluntarily dismiss the case, less than a week after a divided federal appeals court rejected his request to stop the release of the recordings.

The decision means Biden will no longer pursue legal efforts to prevent the material from being disclosed. He had the option to ask the US Supreme Court or the full appeals court to review the ruling but chose not to do so.

In a 2-1 decision issued on Monday, a panel of judges on the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said there was a "substantial" public interest in releasing the recordings.

One judge, Florence Pan, disagreed, saying Biden had a significant privacy interest in keeping the interviews confidential.

The recordings were made in 2016 and 2017 during interviews between Biden and writer Mark Zwonitzer, who helped write Biden's memoirs Promises to Keep and Promise Me, Dad. Biden's legal team argued that the conversations were personal, candid and intended to remain private.

The recordings were later obtained by Special Counsel Robert Hur during his investigation into Biden's handling of classified documents from his time as a US senator and vice president.

Although Hur decided not to bring criminal charges against Biden, Republican lawmakers later sought access to the recordings.

Biden filed the lawsuit to stop the Justice Department under the Trump administration from releasing the material to Congress and the conservative Heritage Foundation.

In June, US District Judge Dabney Friedrich ruled that the public interest in the recordings outweighed Biden's privacy concerns, prompting the former president to appeal before ultimately dropping the case.