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Willow Voice pricing: what the free plan allows and what Pro costs

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Willow Voice pricing starts at free: the Basic plan gives unlimited dictation on Frontier Mini, the model Willow calls weaker, with 20 Scribe uses a week and 5-minute dictations, and Pro costs $15 per user a month, or $12 a month billed yearly, on willowvoice.com as of October 5, 2026. Business is $35 per user a month, or $28 billed yearly, and Enterprise is priced on request. What Pro buys is the better model, Frontier Pro, plus unlimited Scribe, longer dictations and offline dictation.

I built YapToText, a free dictation app that runs on the Mac, so read the last sections with that in mind. Everything about Willow here comes from willowvoice.com and Willow's help center, read on October 3 and October 5, 2026, and each source is listed at the end of the page.

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. Every Willow Voice plan and price
  3. What the free Basic plan includes
  4. What Pro adds, and who gets it for less
  5. Paying, switching devices and canceling
  6. Where your voice goes, plan by plan
  7. Where Willow is the better buy
  8. Where a free on-device app fits
    1. Step 1: Install from the App Store
    2. Step 2: Grant Microphone and Accessibility
    3. Step 3: Quit Willow, turn off Wi-Fi, and dictate
  9. What each one cannot do
    1. Willow Basic
    2. YapToText
  10. The short version
  11. Questions

Steps

  1. Install YapToText from the Mac App Store and open it.
  2. On the permissions page of the tour, press Continue next to Microphone and next to Accessibility, and switch YapToText on in System Settings.
  3. Quit Willow and turn Wi-Fi off.
  4. Click into a text field, tap Right Command, talk, and tap Right Command again, then check the words landed with Wi-Fi still off.

Every Willow Voice plan and price

Checked October 5, 2026, on willowvoice.com/pricing. Prices are in US dollars per user. Prices change, so check before you buy.

PlanBilled monthlyBilled yearlyWhat it adds
Basic$0$0Unlimited use of Frontier Mini, the model Willow calls weaker, limited personalization, 20 Scribe uses a week, and dictation anywhere you type. 5 minutes per dictation.
Pro$15 a month$12 a monthEverything in Basic, plus unlimited use of Frontier Pro, which Willow calls its smartest model, faster priority transcription, a memory of your writing style, unlimited Scribe and longer dictations.
Business$35 a month$28 a monthEverything in Pro, plus enforced privacy mode with zero data retention, SOC 2 Type II, enforced HIPAA compliance, and admin and team controls.
EnterpriseCustomCustomPriced by talking to Willow's sales team.

Pro billed yearly works out to $144 a year, against $180 if you pay month by month. Business billed yearly is $336 a year per user, against $420. That arithmetic is mine, from the prices above. For one person, the choice is Basic or Pro, and the difference is which model hears you.

One caution. Willow's help center has its own plan chart, and on October 5, 2026, it did not match the pricing page: it lists a free plan with 2,000 words a week, Pro at $12 a month billed yearly, and a Team plan at $10 per user a month with shared dictionaries, admin controls and team leaderboards. The pricing page has no word cap on Basic and lists Business at $35 or $28. I have used the pricing page above, but check the price at checkout before you count on either.

What the free Basic plan includes

Willow's Basic plan is a working dictation app, not a trial, and Willow says it needs no credit card. Basic is unlimited on the weaker model; Pro is unlimited on the better one. Here is what Basic includes, per Willow's own pages:

  • Frontier Mini, unlimited. The pricing page calls it the weaker speech-to-text model and lists it as unlimited.
  • 20 Scribe uses a week. Scribe writes a message from a rough description of what you want to say, or rewrites text you select.
  • 5 minutes per dictation. Willow's help center says paid plans raise that to 8 minutes.
  • Limited personalization. The writing-style memory is listed under Pro.
  • Private Mode. On by default, and the help center says it is available on every plan, Basic included.
  • Any app. Dictation goes wherever you type, on Mac, Windows and iPhone.

What Basic does not include: the Frontier Pro model, unlimited Scribe, dictations longer than 5 minutes, and offline dictation, which the help center lists as part of the Pro plan. Remember the help center chart's 2,000 words a week, too. If you dictate a lot, try Basic for a week and watch whether the app says anything about a limit.

What Pro adds, and who gets it for less

Pro is where Willow's better model lives. If you want Frontier Pro, unlimited Scribe or longer dictations, you are looking at Pro. According to its pricing page and help center, Pro adds:

  • Frontier Pro. Willow's smartest speech-to-text model, unlimited, with faster priority transcription.
  • Smart memory. A memory of your writing style, on top of the personal dictionary.
  • Unlimited Scribe. No weekly count on message drafting and rewrites.
  • Longer dictations. Up to 8 minutes in one go, instead of 5.
  • Offline dictation. Listed in the help center's Pro plan.

Students get 30 percent off Pro. Willow's help center says to email its support team with Student Discount as the subject and send proof, such as a student ID card, an enrollment letter, a transcript or an email from your school's domain. The same article's title also names educators, nonprofits and the military, so check it if one of those fits you.

Climb this ladder, smallest commitment first:

  1. Willow Basic. Free, no card, on the weaker model.
  2. Pro, monthly. $15 a month, if you might stop within a year.
  3. Pro, yearly. $12 a month, or $144 a year, if you know you will keep it.
  4. Business. $35 a month per user, or $28 billed yearly, for enforced privacy and team controls.

Paying, switching devices and canceling

Willow sells one subscription for every device. Its help center says that if you subscribe on a Mac, the subscription works on your iPhone and on Windows too. One Pro subscription covers your Mac, PC and iPhone, as long as you sign in the same way everywhere.

  • Sign in the same way. Use the same email and the same sign-in method, Google, Apple or email, on every device. The help center says a mismatch is almost always why Pro shows on one device and not another.
  • Paying on a Mac. Mac purchases go through Stripe. You cancel, change your card or see past bills in the Stripe customer portal, and a canceled plan runs to the end of the period you paid for.
  • Paying on an iPhone. Apple handles the subscription, so you cancel it in your Apple ID settings, not in Willow.
  • Android. Listed as coming soon on Willow's download page.

I could not find a refund policy in Willow's help center, so ask its support team before you buy a year if that matters to you. If you are comparing it with the other cloud app at the same price, the Wispr Flow pricing page breaks down its plans the same way.

Where your voice goes, plan by plan

Willow's help center says it uses cloud-based AI models. What changes by plan is how much is kept and who controls it:

WhatBasic and ProBusiness
Turning speech into textWillow's cloud models; offline dictation is listed under ProWillow's cloud models
Private ModeOn by default; you can switch to Help Willow ImproveEnforced, with zero data retention
Your audio and transcriptsIn Private Mode, not stored on Willow's servers; kept on your deviceEnforced privacy mode
ComplianceNot listed on the planSOC 2 Type II and enforced HIPAA compliance

In Private Mode, the help center says no dictated text is collected, transcripts and context are saved only on your device, and audio is kept on the device only so it can be transcribed again. Help Willow Improve, if you turn it on, collects your transcript text with your account anonymized. Paying more changes who can switch privacy off, not where your words are transcribed. The page on private dictation on a Mac explains what to check in any app.

Where Willow is the better buy

Willow is good software, and for some people it is worth the money. It is the better choice if you need any of these:

  • Windows and iPhone. One account and one subscription on Mac, Windows and iPhone. YapToText is a Mac app only.
  • Scribe. Describe what you want to say and Scribe writes it, including replies that read what is on your screen. YapToText does not write messages for you.
  • More languages. Willow's home page says more than 100. YapToText lists 29 plus auto-detect.
  • Teams and compliance. Business adds enforced privacy, SOC 2 Type II and enforced HIPAA compliance, with admin controls.

If you dictate on a PC or a phone as well as a Mac, Willow goes where YapToText cannot. If the cloud and a subscription are fine with you, those are real reasons to pay. The roundup of Wispr Flow alternatives ranks Willow next to the other cloud apps.

Where a free on-device app fits

YapToText is free with no paid tier, no account and no word count to watch. Tips are optional and add no features. The speech model and the cleanup model both run on your Mac, so there is no weaker free model and no better paid one: everyone gets Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Q5) and Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct, and the only network use is a model download you start yourself. Willow sells the better model; YapToText has one tier, so nobody gets the weaker one.

  • Formatting. Auto mode, on by default, turns a letter into an email, leaves a short chat as spoken and gives everything else a light cleanup. The Auto mode help page has the details.
  • Rewriting a selection. Quick Edit: select text, tap Right Option, say the change, with no weekly count. The Quick Edit guide has examples.
  • Your words. Dictionaries shape what the speech model hears, not only what it types. The Dictionaries help page shows how.
App Store poster headed Nothing leaves your Mac, over YapToText's AI Models page with both models marked Included.
Figure 1. One tier, both models: the AI Models page shows the speech and cleanup models as Included, so every dictation is transcribed on the Mac.

You can check the on-device part yourself in a few minutes:

Step 1: Install from the App Store

  • You: Get YapToText from the Mac App Store and open it.
  • YapToText: Starts a short welcome tour. Both models are inside, so there is nothing else to download.
  • Check: The tour reaches a page titled A couple of permissions.

Step 2: Grant Microphone and Accessibility

  • You: Press Continue next to Microphone, then next to Accessibility.
  • macOS: Asks once for the microphone, then opens System Settings, Privacy & Security, Accessibility, where you switch YapToText on yourself.
  • Check: Both cards read Granted.

Step 3: Quit Willow, turn off Wi-Fi, and dictate

  • You: Quit Willow so two apps are not listening at once, turn Wi-Fi off, click into a text field, tap Right Command, talk, and tap it again. If your hands learned Willow's hold habit, pick Hold to talk on the tour's Your controls page.
  • YapToText: Shows your voice as a wave and types the finished text at your cursor, with no connection.
  • Check: The words land where your cursor was, with Wi-Fi still off.

The trade is real. It runs only on an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later, the download is about 2.9 GB, it lists 29 languages plus auto-detect, and there is no Scribe, no Windows or iPhone app and nothing for teams. My hands make typing difficult, so I dictate every day, and I wanted the good model for free, on my own machine. The free Willow Voice alternative page walks through the full switch, and the offline dictation guide compares apps with Wi-Fi off.

What each one cannot do

Neither app does everything. Willow Basic holds back the better model; YapToText holds back nothing but stays on one Mac.

Willow Basic

  • The weaker model. Frontier Pro is Pro only.
  • Scribe is rationed. 20 uses a week.
  • Short dictations. 5 minutes each.
  • No offline dictation. The help center lists it under Pro.
  • An account. You sign in during setup.

YapToText

  • One kind of computer. An Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later, with no Windows, iPhone or Android version.
  • No message drafting. It cleans up what you said and edits a selection, but it does not write a message from a description.
  • Fewer languages. 29 plus auto-detect.
  • Nothing for teams. No shared dictionaries, admin controls or compliance paperwork.
App Store poster headed Edit anything by voice: the Quick Edit card listening, applying the edit, and done.
Figure 2. The free side of rewriting text: Quick Edit listens for your edit, applies it on the Mac and says Done, with no weekly count.

The comparison of Mac dictation apps covers the apps that keep your voice on the Mac, and the roundup of AI dictation apps sorts the cloud ones too.

The short version

  • Basic. $0, no card: unlimited dictation on the weaker Frontier Mini model, 20 Scribe uses a week and 5-minute dictations.
  • Pro. $15 a month, or $12 billed yearly, for Frontier Pro, unlimited Scribe, 8-minute dictations and offline dictation. Students get 30 percent off.
  • Business. $35 a month per user, or $28 billed yearly, for enforced privacy, SOC 2 Type II and HIPAA. Enterprise is priced on request.
  • The free alternative. YapToText, one tier, both models on your Mac, no account.

Willow charges for the better model and the extra devices; YapToText charges nothing and stays on one Mac.

If a price or limit here no longer matches Willow's site, open an issue on GitHub and I will fix it. 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 much does Willow Voice cost?

Willow Pro is $15 per user a month, or $12 a month billed yearly, which is $144 a year, on willowvoice.com as of October 5, 2026. Business is $35 a month or $28 billed yearly, Enterprise is priced on request, and the Basic plan is free.

Is Willow Voice free?

Yes, with limits. The Basic plan is free with no credit card and gives unlimited dictation on Frontier Mini, the model Willow calls weaker, plus 20 Scribe uses a week and dictations of up to 5 minutes.

What are the limits of the Willow Voice free plan?

The pricing page lists the weaker Frontier Mini model, limited personalization and 20 Scribe uses a week, and the help center sets a 5-minute limit per dictation. A plan chart in the help center also shows 2,000 words a week, which the pricing page does not, so check in the app.

Does Willow Voice have a student discount?

Yes. Willow's help center says students get 30 percent off Pro by emailing its support team with Student Discount as the subject and sending proof of enrollment.

Does one Willow subscription work on iPhone and Windows?

Yes. Willow's help center says one subscription works across Mac, Windows and iOS, as long as you sign in with the same email and the same sign-in method on each device.

Is there a free alternative to Willow Voice?

Yes. YapToText is free for Apple silicon Macs, with one tier, no account and both of its models running on the Mac. Willow's own Basic plan is also free, on its weaker Frontier Mini model.