How to use dictation on a Mac

Every Mac can turn speech into text in any app, for free. This is how to switch it on, start and stop it, speak punctuation and formatting, and fix the usual problems. At the end: what the built-in feature does not do, in case you hit its limits.

By Moe Lueker, founder of Rambleproof. Facts checked 7 October 2026. We make Rambleproof, a separate dictation app that is mentioned once near the end. Everything before that is about the free feature built into macOS, taken from Apple's own guide.

1. Turn it on

Choose Apple menu, then System Settings.
Click Keyboard in the sidebar. You may need to scroll down.
Go to Dictation and turn it on.
Click Enable. macOS may ask whether you want to share audio recordings with Apple; Not Now is a fine answer.

While you are there, look at the text below Dictation. Apple's Dictation guide says it tells you whether your voice is processed on your device and not sent to Siri servers. That depends on your Mac and your language.

2. Start and stop it

Click into any text field: a note, an email, a chat box, a search bar. Then start dictation in one of three ways:

Press the Microphone key, if your keyboard has one in the row of function keys. Press and release it; holding it starts Siri.
Press the Dictation keyboard shortcut (see step 3).
Choose Edit, then Start Dictation, from the menu bar.

When the cursor is highlighted and pulsing, or you hear the tone, speak. To stop, press Escape, the Microphone key or the shortcut again. Apple says you can dictate text of any length without a timeout, and that dictation stops by itself after 30 seconds without speech. On a Mac with Apple silicon you can type while it is listening, without stopping it.

3. Choose your shortcut, language and microphone

All three are in System Settings, Keyboard, under Dictation.

Shortcut. Open the Shortcut pop-up menu and pick one, for example Press Fn (Function) Key Twice, or choose Customize and press the keys you want. Read what the menu says before assuming: a wrong guess about the shortcut is the most common reason dictation seems broken.
Language. Click Edit next to Languages and select your language and region. With more than one, you switch by clicking the language next to the cursor or pressing the Globe key.
Microphone. The pop-up menu next to Microphone source. Automatic listens to the device you are most likely to use. If dictation hears nothing, pick your microphone by name.

4. Speak punctuation and formatting

In supported languages, macOS inserts commas, periods and question marks for you. You can switch that off with the Auto-punctuation setting. You can also say what you want. These are from Apple's list of dictation commands:

Say	You get
period, comma, question mark, exclamation mark	. , ? !
colon, semicolon, ellipsis, dash, hyphen	The mark
quote ... end quote	Quotation marks around what you say between them
open parenthesis ... close parenthesis	( )
new line	One Return
new paragraph	Two Returns
caps on ... caps off	Title Case for the words between
all caps	The next word in capitals
numeral	The next number as a digit
at sign, hashtag, percent sign, dollar sign, ampersand	@ # % $ &
heart emoji, car emoji	The emoji, in some languages

New lines and paragraphs appear when you finish dictating. Words macOS was unsure about are underlined in blue.

5. If it does not work

Nothing happens when you press the key. Check the Shortcut menu in Dictation settings. It may not be the key you think.
It listens but writes nothing. Choose your microphone by name instead of Automatic, and check that the microphone is not muted.
It stops mid-thought. It ends after 30 seconds of silence. Start it again.
It fails without Wi-Fi. Your Mac or language may be using Apple's servers. The text under Dictation in Keyboard settings tells you.

The full list, in the order the causes actually happen, is in Mac dictation not working: the fixes.

Dictation or Voice Control?

macOS has a second feature with a similar name. Dictation types what you say. Voice Control, under System Settings, Accessibility, lets you run the whole Mac by voice: open apps, click buttons, select and replace text (“Replace cat with dog”), and dictate. It also has a custom vocabulary of up to 1,000 terms. Apple's Voice Control guide notes that while Voice Control is on, standard Dictation is not available. If you only want to write by voice, use Dictation. If you want to work hands-free, use Voice Control.

What built-in dictation does not do

For a message or a search, it is all you need. People look for something else when they start dictating for real work, and it is usually for one of these reasons:

It types exactly what you said. Every “um”, repeated word and restart goes on the page, and you tidy it by hand.
It cannot take back a correction. If you say “Tuesday, no, Wednesday”, you get both.
It has no list for your own words. Apple describes a custom vocabulary for Voice Control, not for Dictation, so product names and unusual surnames tend to come out as the nearest common word.
You speak the punctuation wherever auto-punctuation guesses wrong, which interrupts the thought.

Dictation apps exist to cover those gaps. Rambleproof, which we make, is one: you hold a key, talk the way you think, release, and text with the fillers and false starts removed is pasted at your cursor, processed on your Mac. It has a free plan. There are several good ones, and our guide to the best dictation app for Mac sorts six of them by what you need, with Apple's own at the top of the list. A direct comparison is in Apple Dictation vs Rambleproof.

Questions

How do I turn on dictation on a Mac?

Choose Apple menu, System Settings, then Keyboard. Go to Dictation, turn it on, and click Enable. After that you can start it in any text field with the Microphone key, the Dictation keyboard shortcut, or Edit, Start Dictation.

Is dictation on a Mac free?

Yes. Dictation is part of macOS and has no word limit. Apple says you can dictate text of any length without a timeout, and that it stops automatically after 30 seconds without speech.

Does Mac dictation work offline?

It depends on your Mac and language. Apple says the text below Dictation in Keyboard settings shows whether general text dictation is processed on your device and not sent to Siri servers. Its troubleshooting page says you may need an internet connection.

How do I add punctuation when dictating on a Mac?

In supported languages macOS inserts commas, periods and question marks for you. You can also say the mark, for example comma, period, question mark, colon, new line or new paragraph.