Dictate
Hold a key, talk, let go: your words are typed wherever your cursor is. Free, and it runs entirely on your Mac. No account, no cloud, nothing leaves the computer.
↓ Download for Mac./install.sh in the unzipped folder. A notarized build is coming.How it works
- Hold Control+Option (or fn) and talk. Let go and the text appears.
- Control+Option+Space for hands-free; Esc cancels.
- The text stays on your clipboard, so you can paste it again.
- Speech recognition is OpenAI's open-source Whisper model running locally, typically under half a second per sentence.
- Add names it gets wrong to your vocabulary list in Settings.
Optional: AI cleanup
Turn on AI cleanup in the menu bar and paste your own API key (OpenAI, Anthropic or OpenRouter). Each transcript is then rewritten the way you'd have typed it: filler words removed, your spoken corrections applied ("Tuesday, no wait, Wednesday" becomes Wednesday), punctuation and paragraphs fixed, spoken lists turned into lists, and the tone matched to the app you're typing in. Your key stays in your Mac's Keychain. If the service is slow or unavailable, the plain transcript is typed instead.
Privacy
Audio never leaves your Mac. There is no account and no analytics. The only network calls are the one-time model download and, only if you turn on AI cleanup, the transcript text sent to the AI provider you chose with your own key.