- Dictation
- Comparison
- Product
Best offline dictation apps for Mac
Six Mac dictation apps — Superwhisper, VoiceInk, MacWhisper, Handy, Apple’s built‑in, and Snapbak — compared by published prices, engines, and installed size.
Offline dictation on a Mac has quietly become a real market: open‑source engines caught up to the cloud on accuracy, Apple Silicon runs them faster than you can talk, and a wave of small apps shipped around them. Five of the six below run entirely on your machine — nothing you say reaches a server. The exception is Superwhisper, which layers its own cloud models on top; its section below says what to check. Figures are published prices from our October 2026 scan. I make Snapbak, so read my row with that in mind.
The field
| App | Engine | Price | Installed (Mac) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Dictation | Apple’s on‑device engine | Free, built in | Built in |
| Handy | Whisper or Canary, fully offline | Free (MIT licence) | 43 MB |
| VoiceInk | whisper.cpp or Parakeet, local | $25 / $39 / $49 one‑time | 125 MB |
| MacWhisper | Local Whisper or Parakeet, BYOK | €64 one‑time | — |
| Superwhisper | Local Whisper + own cloud models | $8.49/mo · $84.99/yr · $249.99 lifetime | 256 MB |
| Snapbak | Parakeet on the Neural Engine | Free early access; Pro planned at $69 | 19.8 MB measured, models on demand |
Apple Dictation — the free default
Built into macOS, types into any field, and on Apple Silicon much of it runs on‑device. No custom dictionary worth the name, no filler cleanup, and punctuation needs a second pass. For occasional short dictation it’s genuinely fine — here’s how to turn it on.
Handy — free and open‑source
Free under the MIT licence, fully offline, 43 MB in a Tauri shell. Handy does one job — hold a key, get text — and does it without telemetry or an account. What it doesn’t do: a personal dictionary for names and jargon, or anything beyond dictation.
VoiceInk — the one‑time local app
$25 / $39 / $49 one‑time tiers, 125 MB, GPLv3. VoiceInk runs whisper.cpp or Parakeet locally and stays out of your way. A solid pick if you want a paid app’s polish without a subscription; the trade is that it’s dictation only, another menu‑bar resident rather than part of your capture app.
MacWhisper — transcripts first
€64 one‑time. MacWhisper grew out of transcription: drop in audio files, get transcripts, and the Pro tier auto‑records meetings. As a dictation‑into‑any‑app tool it works; as a transcript studio it’s stronger.
Superwhisper — the modes machine
$8.49 a month, $84.99 a year, or $249.99 lifetime; 256 MB installed. Superwhisper’s custom modes (dictate an email, dictate a commit) are the feature its users rave about. Note the shape: a local app with its own cloud models on top — check which features need the network before you buy.
Snapbak — dictation inside the capture app
Free for the first 100 users; Pro planned at $69 one‑time. Snapbak runs Parakeet on the Neural Engine in a separate helper process: measured on our bench, ten seconds of speech becomes text in 0.058 seconds, with median 0.44 seconds from key‑up to text in the app you’re typing in, offline, English‑only. The dictionary spells names and jargon right, history is searchable, and dictation ships inside the app that also records your screen and takes screenshots — one installer, one purchase, no second menu‑bar resident.
How to choose
- Free and minimal: Handy, or Apple’s built‑in.
- One‑time purchase, dictation only: VoiceInk or MacWhisper.
- Custom modes per context: Superwhisper.
- Dictation bundled with capture and bug reporting: Snapbak.
The model‑level comparison — Whisper versus Parakeet, measured on the same clips — is in its own post, and the accuracy numbers are in the Neural Engine deep dive.