Transcriptionįor what it’s worth, I also looked at a few transcription apps and services, which convert recordings of your voice into text for a fee. I haven’t used it much but it seems to work. But… you’ll only be able to select it if you are using Google’s Chrome web browser, since it isn’t available in Safari. You’ll find the second free option in Google Docs, where you can select Voice Typing from the Tools menu to dictate rather than type. This will let you perform myriad actions with your voice including selecting text moving the cursor to the beginning or end of a selection, sentence, paragraph, or document formatting text scrolling, and more. macOS Dictation is not as accurate or powerful as Dragon (Mac or Windows), but it’s a hell of a lot better than nothing.Ĭlick Enable Advanced Commands to get voice control options like these. In the Accessibility System Preferences pane’s Dictation tab, click the Dictation Commands button and then click Enable Advanced Commands.

If you don’t, you’ll be unable to use Dictation without an Internet connection.Ĭhoose Use Enhanced Dictation to dictate without an Internet connection. Check the Use Enhanced Dictation checkbox on the Keyboard System Preferences pane’s Dictation tab.I recommend two tweaks that make Dictation more useful: This lets you dictate on your Mac in any document or field that can accept text input. One of the free options is macOS Dictation, which you enable in the Keyboard System Preferences pane’s Dictation tab. The most expensive and odious option (IMHO) is the Windows version of Dragon Professional (from $300) running on your Mac under emulation like Parallels Desktop (from $63.99), VMWare Fusion Pro ($40), or Boot Camp (free with macOS).Īs odious as I find this option, it is the only one that compares to the late Dragon Professional For Mac feature-wise. That being said, the other two options have obvious advantages: They’re both free, they both work on most modern Macs, and they’re both better than no speech recognition at all.

The word “Replace” is in quotes for a reason: Only the most expensive and odious option offers the same (or better) features as the late Dragon Professional for Mac. The other two options are decent and free, but they don’t offer features like voice training or extensive customization. I have found three possible options to “replace” Dragon Professional on the Mac. Since Nuance was the only developer of high-quality voice recognition software for the Mac, this leaves us with no “professional” grade voice recognition options for the Mac. And, that technical support for the product would be discontinued in 90 days (US) and 180 days (most other countries). Nuance, developer of Dragon Professional Individual for Mac, announced that the product would be discontinued effective and will no longer be available for purchase.

How to activate voice dictation on mac