Every Mac includes Dictation. It turns your speech into text wherever you can type: an email, a document, a search field or a chat. This guide shows how to turn it on, how to start and stop it, how to add punctuation by voice and what to check when it stops working.

Menu names below follow Apple's current Mac User Guide. Older macOS versions can label a few settings slightly differently.

Turn on Dictation

  1. Choose Apple menu > System Settings.
  2. Click Keyboard in the sidebar. You may need to scroll down.
  3. Under Dictation, turn Dictation on, then click Enable.
  4. If macOS asks whether to share audio recordings with Apple, choose Share Audio Recordings or Not Now.

Source: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/use-dictation-mh40584/mac

Start and stop dictating

Click where you want the text to appear. Then press the Microphone key if your keyboard has one, use your Dictation keyboard shortcut, or choose Edit > Start Dictation. Start speaking when the cursor pulses or you hear the ready tone.

Press and release the Microphone key to dictate. Holding it down starts Siri instead.

To stop, press Escape, the Microphone key or your Dictation shortcut. Dictation also stops on its own after about 30 seconds without speech. There is no limit on how long you dictate while you keep talking.

Choose your Dictation shortcut

Open System Settings > Keyboard, find Dictation and click the Shortcut menu. Choose one of the listed shortcuts, such as pressing the fn key twice, or choose Customize and press the keys you want.

If you also use another dictation app, give each one a different key. Two apps listening for the same key is a common reason one of them seems to do nothing.

Add punctuation and new lines by voice

In supported languages, Dictation adds commas, periods and question marks for you. You can turn this off with the Auto-punctuation switch under Keyboard > Dictation.

You can also say punctuation and formatting out loud:

  • Say the mark's name, such as "comma", "question mark" or "exclamation mark".
  • Say "new line" for one line break or "new paragraph" for two.
  • Say an emoji's name, such as "heart emoji".

Words Dictation is unsure about are underlined in blue. Click one to pick an alternative, or type or dictate the fix.

Pick the language and microphone

Under Keyboard > Dictation, click Edit next to Languages to add or remove languages. While dictating, click the language indicator next to the cursor to switch.

Use the Microphone source menu in the same place to choose a microphone. Automatic picks the one you are most likely to use.

Does Mac Dictation work offline?

It depends on your Mac and language. Under Keyboard > Dictation, macOS states whether your speech and transcripts are processed on your Mac or sent to Apple's servers. Where processing happens on the Mac, you can dictate without a connection. Otherwise Dictation needs the internet.

Mac Dictation not working? Check these first

Apple lists these checks when Dictation doesn't respond or misrecognizes you:

  1. Make sure Dictation is turned on in System Settings > Keyboard.
  2. Check that the right language and region are selected.
  3. Use the shortcut that is actually set under Keyboard > Dictation.
  4. If your Mac has no built-in microphone, connect an external one and select it in Sound or Keyboard settings.
  5. Raise the input volume in System Settings > Sound > Input.
  6. Keep the microphone uncovered, and speak at your normal volume and position.
  7. In a noisy or echoing room, try a headset microphone.
  8. If Dictation is processed on Apple's servers for your setup, check your connection in System Settings > Network.

Source: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/mchlc480652b/mac

One more check from our own support work: if another app also uses the fn key or the same shortcut, change one of them and try again.

When an AI dictation app is a better fit

Built-in Dictation types close to what you said. If you speak in full, tidy sentences, that is often all you need, and it is free.

Natural speech is messier. It has fillers, restarts and corrections like "let's meet Tuesday, no, Wednesday". With Dictation you clean that up by hand afterwards. An AI dictation app adds a cleanup step that removes fillers and applies your spoken corrections before the text appears.

LoQuill is one example. You hold the fn key in any app, speak and release, and both the speech recognition and the cleanup run on your Mac, so it works offline. It needs an Apple Silicon Mac with macOS 15 or later and is tuned for English.

The comparison guide explains the difference in more detail: https://loquill.app/blog/apple-dictation-vs-ai-dictation

Try LoQuill free for 7 days, no card needed: https://loquill.app/trial