Guides

Spanish dictation on a Mac: set it up in Apple Dictation or YapToText

By · Published

To dictate in Spanish on a Mac, add Spanish to Apple Dictation in System Settings, Keyboard, Dictation, by clicking Edit next to Languages, or choose Spanish (Spain or Mexico) in the Language picker on YapToText's AI Models page. Either way, you speak Spanish and Spanish text lands at your cursor, in any app.

I built YapToText, a free dictation app that runs OpenAI's Whisper on your Mac, because my hands make typing difficult, and I dictate every day. I have not tested Spanish dictation myself, so this page sticks to what each setting does and where it lives, and tells you how to check the results. The guide to Mac dictation languages has the full list for both apps; this page is only about Spanish.

Download YapToText on the Mac App StoreDownload for free. No account, nothing locked, macOS 14 or later on Apple silicon. Source on GitHub.

On this page: 11 sections
  1. Steps
  2. Set Apple Dictation to Spanish
    1. Step 1: Add Spanish
    2. Spanish punctuation in Apple Dictation
  3. Set YapToText to Spanish
    1. Step 1: Pick Spanish
    2. Step 2: Dictate a Spanish sentence
  4. Use a model that hears Spanish
  5. Spoken commands are English until you change them
    1. Add a Spanish name to a command
  6. Spain, Mexico and the rest of the Spanish-speaking world
  7. A short example
  8. If Spanish comes out wrong
  9. What each one cannot do
  10. The short version
  11. Questions

Steps

  1. Open YapToText's AI Models page and, in Your defaults, choose Spanish (Spain or Mexico) in the Language picker.
  2. Make sure the dictation model is multilingual, such as the default Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5), not a model with (English) in its name.
  3. Click where the words should go, tap Right Command, say a sentence in Spanish, and tap Right Command again.
  4. In History, click Show pipeline details and check the Language line and the raw transcript.
  5. On the Commands page, add the Spanish names you would say to the punctuation commands you use.

Set Apple Dictation to Spanish

Apple Dictation is built into macOS, and its language list works by language and region, so Spanish is something you add once in Keyboard settings. In Apple Dictation, Spanish is a language and a region you add under Dictation in Keyboard settings.

Step 1: Add Spanish

  • You: Choose Apple menu, System Settings, then Keyboard. Go to Dictation, turn it on if it is off, click Edit next to Languages, and select Spanish with the region you speak.
  • macOS: Adds it to Dictation. With more than one language set up, it shows the current language next to the cursor while you dictate, as an abbreviation or a character.
  • Check: Start dictating. If another language is showing, click the language next to the cursor, or press the Globe key if your keyboard has one, to switch to Spanish.

Apple keeps its list of Dictation languages on its macOS Feature Availability page. Its Dictation section lists Spanish for several regions, among them Spain, Mexico and the United States, and all three also appear under automatic punctuation and dictating emoji. Apple also says Dictation is not available in all languages or regions and that its features vary, so look up your own region there before you count on a feature. Whether your voice is processed on the Mac or sent to Siri servers is shown in the text below Dictation in Keyboard settings.

Spanish punctuation in Apple Dictation

In supported languages, Apple adds commas, periods and question marks for you as you talk. For a mark it does not add, Apple's Spanish-language Mac guides say to speak the name of the mark, and give "signo de admiración" as the example. Its Spanish command list includes names such as "punto", "coma", "punto y coma" and "signo de interrogación", and "nueva línea" and "nuevo párrafo" for line breaks.

Those Spanish pages are written for macOS 12 and 13, so open the Comandos para dictar texto page for your own version of macOS before you rely on a name. The Mac dictation commands guide has Apple's English list, and automatic punctuation on a Mac explains the setting that adds marks for you.

Set YapToText to Spanish

YapToText, the free app I built, has one Language picker for every dictation, and Spanish has two entries in it: Spain and Mexico. It runs Whisper on your Mac for Spanish the same as for English, needs an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later, and is free on the Mac App Store. Pick Spanish once, and it is the default language for every dictation after that.

Step 1: Pick Spanish

  • You: Open YapToText's AI Models page. In Your defaults, under the dictation model, open the Language picker and choose Spanish, Spain or Mexico.
  • YapToText: Hands that language to Whisper as a hint for every dictation from then on. Out of the box it uses your Mac's system language, not Auto-detect, so if your Mac runs in English, this is the step that makes it listen for Spanish.
  • Check: The picker shows the Spanish entry you chose.

Step 2: Dictate a Spanish sentence

  • You: Click where the words should go, tap Right Command, say a sentence in Spanish, and tap it again.
  • YapToText: Finishes the transcript on your Mac and types it at your cursor, in any app.
  • Check: Open the dictation in History and click Show pipeline details. The Language line shows the setting that dictation used.
The AI Models page in YapToText: Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) and Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct marked Included, model library below.
Figure 1. The Language picker sits under the dictation model in Your defaults, shown here on English (United States). Choose one of the two Spanish entries in the same picker.

A change in the picker applies from the next dictation, never to the one already running. If you write in Spanish only part of the day, Auto-detect language or a mode with Spanish as its language may suit you better than changing the default each time; the guide to Mac dictation languages shows both, and the first dictation guide covers the key and the panel.

Use a model that hears Spanish

Not every speech model YapToText offers can hear Spanish, and the picker cannot change that. A model with (English) in its name hears English only, whatever the picker says.

  • The default. Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5), 574 MB and bundled in the App Store build, is multilingual, so Spanish works with no download.
  • English only. Whisper Tiny (English), Base (English) and Small (English) hear English only. If you picked one to save memory, select a multilingual model again before you dictate in Spanish.
  • Other choices. The rest of the Dictation Model Library, from Whisper Base and Small without (English) in the name up to Whisper Large v3, carries no English-only mark. The AI models guide sums it up: bigger models hear better, and smaller ones are lighter on battery and memory.
  • The Homebrew build. It ships without models, so download Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) from the Dictation Model Library before your first dictation.

After Whisper, the words go to cleanup, unless the mode is Raw Transcription. Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct, the bundled cleanup model, is listed as multilingual, and Clean Up is told to keep your language and not translate, so the tidying is meant to leave Spanish as Spanish. The app's catalog suggests Qwen 2.5 3B Instruct, 1.9 GB in the Cleanup Model Library, especially for non-English dictation. To try it, download it, click the circle at the start of its row, and compare a few Spanish dictations in History.

Raw Transcription never touches a cleanup model, so it is the clean way to see Whisper's Spanish on its own. With Auto mode on, press 2 while you talk, in the default order, to use it for one dictation. The AI models guide covers downloading and selecting models, and offline dictation covers working with Wi-Fi off, which is the same in Spanish.

Spoken commands are English until you change them

Two parts of YapToText stay English when you dictate in Spanish. The app's own screens are in English only, and the default spoken commands are English phrases, such as "question mark" or "insert comma". You can edit any command, or add trigger phrases of your own, on the Commands page. Add the Spanish names you would say to the commands you use, and keep the English ones beside them.

Add a Spanish name to a command

  • You: Open the Commands page and its Punctuation tab, use the search field to find the row, and add your phrase to the phrases it already lists, separated by a comma. Or press the Add button under the list and type your phrase under Say this and the mark under Inserts.
  • YapToText: Saves it as you type. One command can answer to several phrases, and longer phrases are matched first.
  • Check: Dictate a sentence that ends with your phrase, with insert in front if the phrase is one word, and the mark lands instead of the words.
App Store poster headed Teach it your words, showing the Dictionaries page and the Commands page side by side.
Figure 2. On the right, the Commands page, where the default English names live. Each command can answer to more phrases, so a Spanish name can sit next to the English one.

The same rules apply to the names you add as to the English ones:

  • Two words or more. Names of two or more words fire on their own, with no insert, when they end a clause, so a name such as "signo de interrogación" needs nothing in front.
  • One word. One-word names need the word insert in front while Require the word “insert” before a command is on, which is the default. That word is English, so a one-word name such as "coma" becomes "insert coma".
  • Why the switch is there. It keeps ordinary speech from turning into symbols. Spanish uses punto in everyday phrases such as punto de vista, so I would leave the switch on.
  • Exact words. A name fires only when Whisper writes those exact words. Read the raw transcript in History to see how Whisper spelled your phrase, accents included, and type it the same way.

You may need fewer of these than you think, because Whisper punctuates ordinary speech by itself; a few of your own sentences will show you which marks it leaves out. The spoken punctuation guide lists every default name and explains the insert rule in full.

Spain, Mexico and the rest of the Spanish-speaking world

YapToText's picker has two Spanish entries, Spain and Mexico, and Apple's list goes by region and is longer. Pick the entry closest to the Spanish you speak, then let your own dictations tell you whether it was the right one.

  • Spain or Mexico. Pick the matching entry, in either app.
  • Anywhere else. YapToText has no separate entry for Argentina, Colombia, the United States or any other country. Try both Spanish entries with the same few sentences and keep the one that does better, or try Auto-detect language. For Apple Dictation, look up your region on the Feature Availability page.
  • What the entry does. In YapToText, the setting is a language hint to Whisper. I do not claim that the Spain or Mexico entry tunes Whisper to that region's accent or vocabulary; picking Spanish at all is the part that matters.

OpenAI's own README says Whisper's performance varies widely depending on the language, so try Spanish with a few real sentences before you rely on it. I have not tested Spanish dictation myself, so there are no accuracy figures here, for either app. Names of people and places that come out wrong the same way every time can be taught on the Dictionaries page. The guide to dictation with an accent covers the microphone, the dictionary and bigger models, and little of it is tied to one language. For everything else that affects accuracy, improving dictation accuracy puts the fixes in order.

A short example

Here is the whole flow with YapToText, from a Spanish sentence to text at the cursor. You speak Spanish, and Spanish is typed: nothing is translated along the way.

Say: With a Spanish entry chosen in the Language picker and the cursor in a message.

hola Marta llego a la oficina a las diez quieres comer juntas después

What happens: Whisper hears it on your Mac as Spanish, adds the punctuation it can work out by itself, and YapToText types it at your cursor. Any cleanup the mode runs is told to keep it in Spanish. I have not run this sentence myself, so read the result, and the raw transcript in History, before you trust it.

Going the other way is a separate, deliberate step. If you wrote something in English and want it in Spanish, select it and ask Quick Edit.

Say: After selecting an English sentence in any app and tapping Right Option.

translate it to Spanish

What happens: Tap Right Option again, and the translation replaces your selection. The cleanup model on your Mac writes it, so read a long one before you send it. The Quick Edit guide lists what else you can ask for.

If Spanish comes out wrong

Climb this ladder, smallest step first:

  1. Check the picker. The Language picker on the AI Models page sets the default, and it starts on your Mac's system language, not Spanish.
  2. Check the mode. A mode with its own language overrides the picker, and an app listed under a mode's Apps that use this mode uses that mode's language, if the mode sets one.
  3. Check the model. A model with (English) in its name hears English only. Switch back to Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) or another multilingual model.
  4. Read the raw transcript. In History, Show pipeline details puts what Whisper heard above the final text. If the Spanish is wrong there, Whisper misheard it; if it is right there and wrong in the final text, the cleanup, a dictionary entry or a command changed it.
  5. Try the other setting. If a fixed Spanish entry gives odd results, try the other entry or Auto-detect; if Auto-detect guesses the wrong language, fix the language by hand.
  6. Try another cleanup model. Qwen 2.5 3B Instruct is the one the app's catalog suggests for non-English dictation.
  7. Tell me. Open an issue on GitHub with the language entry, a sample sentence and the raw transcript.
A YapToText History entry with pipeline details open: raw transcript, cleaned transcript, mode, delivery, target app and timings.
Figure 3. Show pipeline details in History puts the raw transcript above the final text and names the language the dictation used, here en-US. A Spanish dictation should show Spanish there.

For Apple Dictation, look at the language shown next to the cursor while you talk, and at the Languages list under Dictation in Keyboard settings. The Mac dictation not working guide goes through Apple's other fixes.

What each one cannot do

  • Apple Dictation. Apple says it is not available in all languages or regions and that its features vary, so a feature that works in Spanish for one region may not in another. It stops by itself after 30 seconds without speech, and whether your voice leaves the Mac depends on what Keyboard settings says.
  • YapToText. Its screens are in English only, and its default commands are English phrases until you add your own. It has two Spanish entries, Spain and Mexico. It sets the language when a dictation starts, so it does not switch between Spanish and English in the middle of a sentence, and it does not translate as you speak. It needs an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later.
  • This page. I have not tested Spanish dictation in either app, so there are no accuracy claims here, only settings.

If you move between Spanish and English through the day, the languages guide shows how to tie a language to an app or a shortcut. Both apps can type Spanish; only you can judge how well they hear your Spanish.

The short version

  • Apple Dictation. System Settings, Keyboard, Dictation, Edit next to Languages, then Spanish and your region.
  • YapToText. The Language picker on the AI Models page, Spanish (Spain or Mexico), with a multilingual model such as the default.
  • Commands. English by default; add the Spanish names you would say on the Commands page.
  • Test. A few real sentences, then the raw transcript in History.

Set the language first, check the model second, and judge it by your own sentences.

If Spanish misbehaves in a way this page does not cover, open an issue on GitHub with the entry you picked and a sample sentence. Every one gets read.

Download YapToText on the Mac App StoreDownload for free. No account, nothing locked, macOS 14 or later on Apple silicon. Source on GitHub.

About the author. Ryleigh Newman is a developer whose hands make typing difficult and who dictates every day with YapToText, the app this site describes. Facts about other apps come from their own sites, with the date they were read. More about the project.

Sources

Questions

How do I dictate in Spanish on a Mac?

In Apple Dictation, open System Settings, Keyboard, Dictation, click Edit next to Languages and select Spanish with your region. In YapToText, choose Spanish (Spain or Mexico) in the Language picker on the AI Models page, then tap Right Command and talk.

How do I say punctuation in Spanish with Mac dictation?

Apple Dictation adds commas, periods and question marks by itself in supported languages, and its Spanish guides list names such as punto, coma and signo de interrogación. In YapToText the default command names are English, and you can add Spanish names on the Commands page.

Does YapToText support Spanish?

Yes. Its Language picker has two Spanish entries, Spain and Mexico, and the default speech model, Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5), is multilingual. Everything runs on your Mac.

Should I pick Spanish (Spain) or Spanish (Mexico)?

Pick the one closest to the Spanish you speak. If you speak another variety, try both entries with the same few sentences, or Auto-detect, and keep whichever gives better results.

Why does my Spanish dictation come out in English?

In YapToText, check the Language picker, which starts on your Mac's system language, any mode with its own language, and the speech model: models with (English) in the name hear English only. In Apple Dictation, check the language shown next to the cursor.

Can I speak English and get Spanish text?

Not while you dictate. YapToText types what you said in the language you said it. To translate afterward, select the text, tap the Quick Edit key and say translate it to Spanish.