Guides

Speech to text for Mac that runs on the Mac

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Speech to text on a Mac takes one key and your voice: Apple Dictation is built in and fine for short bursts, and YapToText types what you say into any app, with the speech model running on the Mac itself. YapToText is free with no paid tier and open source under the GPL, and it needs an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later.

I built it because my hands make typing difficult, and speech to text is how I write every day. This page is about doing it well. If you are still choosing, my roundup of free speech to text apps for Mac lays the options side by side, and the best dictation software for Mac page ranks the ones that type into other apps.

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: 10 sections
  1. Steps
  2. Check the three things that can go wrong
    1. Accessibility is on
    2. The microphone hears you
    3. The words land where you wanted them
  3. Know what runs on your Mac
  4. See how it compares with Apple Dictation
  5. Fix and reshape what you already wrote
  6. Teach it your names and punctuation
  7. If the words do not land
  8. What it cannot do
  9. The short version
  10. Questions

Steps

  1. Install YapToText free from the Mac App Store on an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later.
  2. Open it and allow the microphone when macOS asks.
  3. On the Home page, press Grant next to Accessibility, then switch YapToText on in System Settings so it can type into other apps.
  4. Click where you want the words, tap Right Command, and talk.
  5. Tap Right Command again, and the text lands at your cursor.

Check the three things that can go wrong

Most first tries work. When one does not, it is almost always the permission, the microphone or the cursor, and the first dictation help page has the long version. Check each one with your own eyes, in this order.

Accessibility is on

  • You: On YapToText's Home page, in the Get set up card, press Grant next to Accessibility.
  • macOS: Opens System Settings, Privacy & Security, Accessibility. An app cannot switch this on for itself.
  • Check: The switch next to YapToText is on. If it will not stay on, press Show in Finder, drag the app into the list, and press Recheck.

The microphone hears you

  • You: Tap Right Command and say a sentence.
  • YapToText: Opens the floating panel with your voice as a wave and your words as they form, and the capybara's speech bubble in the menu bar turns red.
  • Check: The wave moves when you speak. If it stays flat, choose your microphone in Settings, General, Microphone, or in the menu bar panel's Input picker.
The expanded YapToText panel with a live waveform and the transcribed sentence beneath it.
Figure 1. The panel while you talk: the wave moves with your voice, and the words land at your cursor when you stop.

The words land where you wanted them

  • You: Tap Right Command again.
  • YapToText: Finishes the transcript on your Mac, pastes it at your cursor and puts back whatever you had copied before.
  • Check: The words are in your document. The first dictation after launch waits a moment while the model loads; the ones after it are quicker.

Right Command is only the default. The keys and shortcuts page shows how to pick another key, or switch to Hold to talk.

Know what runs on your Mac

Two models ship inside the App Store version. Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5), 574 MB, turns your voice into words, and Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct, shown as 2.3 GB, turns the words into finished text when a mode asks for it. Both run on the Mac. There is no account, no analytics and no tracking, and History is a file in the app's own folder on your Mac. Your voice never leaves your Mac.

The AI Models page in YapToText: Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) and Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct marked Included, model library below.
Figure 2. The AI Models page with both bundled models marked Included: Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) turns your voice into words, and Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct turns the words into finished text.

The only network use is a model download you start yourself, over HTTPS from Hugging Face, and the App Store version never needs one unless you pick a different model. The Homebrew build is the exception: it is about 12 MB because it ships without the models, so it cannot dictate until you download a speech model on the AI Models page. The AI Models help page covers both libraries, and the offline dictation page has a test you can run with Wi-Fi off.

If what you dictate is confidential, the private dictation guide covers where your voice goes with each kind of tool and how to limit what History keeps.

See how it compares with Apple Dictation

Apple Dictation is the right first try. It is already on your Mac, it works anywhere you can type, and Apple's guide says you can dictate text of any length, though it stops when it hears no speech for 30 seconds. Here is how it lines up with YapToText and with the free plan of Spokenly, another app that runs local models.

Checked October 3, 2026, on each maker's own pages. Plans change, so check before you rely on one.

YapToTextApple DictationSpokenly, free plan
Types into any appYesYesYes
Where your voice goesStays on the MacOn the Mac for supported languages on Apple silicon; otherwise to AppleStays on the Mac with local models
Edits selected text by voiceYes, Quick EditNo; Voice Control canNot stated
Shapes text for the app you are inYes, Auto modeNoModes that switch on by app or website
Cap on the free versionNoneNone; stops after 30 seconds of silenceNo usage limits on local models
Open sourceYes, GPL-3.0NoNo; its site says its code is proprietary
Oldest macOS14Built in13.3

Apple's guide for macOS Sonoma says dictation on an Intel Mac, or in a language without on-device support, is sent to Apple, and the current guide says Keyboard settings show whether yours stays on the device. If Apple Dictation is enough for you, use it. The guide to using dictation on a Mac walks through turning it on.

Fix and reshape what you already wrote

Speech to text is only half the job when your hands cannot do the fixing afterwards. Four features cover the other half, and all four run on the Mac.

  • Intelligent Insert. Before the text lands, the app reads the words around your cursor, so a dictation into the middle of a sentence gets a lowercase first word, one space where words would collide, and no stray period. It reads with a few invisible keystrokes, and some apps beep at one of them; the Intelligent Insert help page has the fix.
  • Auto mode. On by default. A letter with a greeting and a sign-off becomes an email, short chat stays exactly as spoken, and everything else gets a light pass that fixes what was misheard. End a dictation with "make that formal" or "as a bullet list" to steer it, and the Auto mode help page lists every phrase.
  • Quick Edit. Select text in any app, tap Right Option, say the change and tap again: make it shorter, fix the grammar, translate it to Spanish. The result replaces your selection.
  • Corrections by voice. Right after a dictation lands, "scratch that" removes it and "replace X with Y" fixes one word, with no key at all, as long as you say the exact phrase within 30 seconds.
The Quick Edit card applying an edit: a glowing ring, the words Applying your edit, and Press Esc to cancel.
Figure 3. Quick Edit applying a change to a selection. Press Esc while it works and the card says nothing was changed.

All of it works wherever you can type, from Mail to a browser field, and the guide to dictating into any app goes app by app.

Teach it your names and punctuation

Dictionaries fix the words the speech model does not know. Add a name on the Dictionaries page, or select the right spelling anywhere, tap Right Option and say "add this to my dictionary". A dictionary shapes what the app hears, not just what it types, and if you fix the same word twice the app asks whether to make the correction stick. The Dictionaries help page has the details.

Whisper punctuates ordinary speech on its own. For the marks it cannot guess, say the name at the end of a clause:

Say: Finish a question this way.

is it working now, question mark

What happens: You get "is it working now?" with no stray mark left behind. One-word names such as comma take the word "insert" first while Require the word insert before a command is on, which is the default, and the spoken punctuation page has the full list.

YapToText's Commands page: Enable voice commands on, Require the word insert before a command on, and the Snippets tab.
Figure 4. The Commands page, where Require the word insert before a command is on out of the box. The Punctuation tab beside Snippets lists every spoken mark.

If the words do not land

When a dictation goes somewhere unexpected, climb this ladder, smallest step first:

  1. Click into another app first. YapToText never types into its own window, so a dictation started while it is in front goes to the clipboard.
  2. Turn on Accessibility. Without it, every dictation is copied to the clipboard instead of typed. The Home page's Get set up card shows whether it is on.
  3. Check Insert text automatically. It sits in the Dictation page's Delivery card, on by default. Off, every dictation goes to the clipboard.
  4. Pin a method for that app. If one app rejects the paste, add it under Per-app method in Settings, Advanced, and choose Type character-by-character.
  5. Read the troubleshooting page. The YapToText troubleshooting page covers the rarer cases. If Apple's own Dictation is the one failing, the Mac dictation not working guide is the place to start.

What it cannot do

  • Intel Macs. It needs Apple silicon and macOS 14 or later, and nothing is claimed for Intel.
  • Its own window. It never types into YapToText itself, so dictate into another app.
  • Reading around the cursor in terminals. Intelligent Insert switches itself off in Terminal, iTerm2, Warp and the other terminals, because its keystrokes are shortcuts there. The words still land.
  • Password fields. While Secure Input is on, text is typed instead of pasted, and Quick Edit cannot read a selection.
  • Speakers and timestamps. It does not label speakers or add timestamps, in dictation or in file transcription.

Languages are a setting, not a guess: the Language picker on the AI Models page lists 29 languages plus Auto-detect, and it starts on your Mac's system language. The Mac dictation languages page covers switching.

The short version

  • Try Apple Dictation first. It is built in and fine for short bursts.
  • Install YapToText for speech to text all day. It is free, types into any app, and runs on the Mac.
  • Check three things if it stalls. Accessibility, the wave in the panel, and a cursor in another app.

On a MacBook, talk to text on a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro covers the Microphone key and the one difference a laptop brings, its microphone.

One key, your voice, and the words land where your cursor was. If something here does not match what you see, open an issue on GitHub. 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

Does Mac have speech to text?

Yes. Apple Dictation is built into macOS: turn it on in System Settings, Keyboard, Dictation, and start it with the Dictation keyboard shortcut. YapToText is a free app that adds editing by voice and formatting for the app you are in.

Is there a free speech to text app for Mac?

Yes. YapToText is free with no paid tier and runs on the Mac. superwhisper and Spokenly have free plans for local models, and Apple Dictation is built in.

Does speech to text on Mac work without internet?

Yes with YapToText from the Mac App Store: both models ship inside the app, so it works with Wi-Fi off. The Homebrew build needs one speech model download first. Apple Dictation works offline for supported languages on Apple silicon.

How accurate is speech to text on a Mac?

It depends on the model, the microphone and the room, and I have not run a word error test across every app, so I do not rank them by accuracy. YapToText uses Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) by default, and its AI Models page rates every model with stars for accuracy and speed, so you can pick a heavier one.

Which Macs does YapToText run on?

Apple silicon Macs with macOS 14 or later. Nothing is claimed for Intel Macs.

Is there a free speech to text converter for Mac?

Yes, in two senses. To convert your voice to text as you speak, tap one key and talk, and YapToText types the words at your cursor. To convert a recording, drop the audio or video file on its Utility page and the text comes back on your Mac, with nothing uploaded to an online converter.