Dictate / For developers
Dictate to Claude Code, Cursor and ChatGPT
Prompts are prose, and you talk faster than you type. Hold a key in your terminal or editor, explain what you want, let go. The text lands at the cursor, transcribed on your Mac.
7 days free, then $49 once, lifetime license, no subscription · Apple Silicon Mac · macOS 14 Sonoma or later
Your prompts are the slow part now
Working with an AI coding agent means writing paragraphs: what the bug is, what you already tried, which files matter, what "done" looks like. A good prompt is long, and typing it is where the minutes go. Most people cut it short, and the agent guesses the rest.
Speaking it takes a fraction of the time, so you include the context you would have skipped. The same goes for the rest of the prose in a developer's day: commit messages, pull request descriptions, review comments, the Slack reply explaining why the migration is late.
Works in the terminal, because it just pastes
Dictate has no plugin and no editor integration to install. Hold your key, speak, release, and the text is pasted at your cursor wherever it is: Claude Code in a terminal, the Cursor chat panel, ChatGPT in a browser tab, a commit message in your editor. It never presses Return, so nothing runs before you've read it. The text stays on your clipboard too, so if a field refuses the paste, press ⌘V.
Pick a key you never type with. Right Option is the default; Fn on the laptop and F18 on a split keyboard work well, and Dictate remembers a different key for each keyboard.
Teach it your vocabulary once
Speech models know English, not your stack. Out of the box you may get "clawed code", a mangled repo name or a colleague's name spelled three ways. Substitutions fix that: write down what Dictate hears and what it should type, once, and every dictation after comes out right. "Clawed code" → "Claude Code" ships as the example.
Hesitations go too. Dictate removes "um", "uh" and stuttered repeats on your Mac as you dictate, so a spoken prompt reads like a typed one.
Your code context stays on your machine
What you describe in a prompt is often more sensitive than the prompt looks: client names, internal hostnames, the security bug you're fixing. Dictate transcribes on the Neural Engine with NVIDIA Parakeet, so your voice is never uploaded and dictation works on a plane or behind a locked-down VPN. Where the prompt goes after you paste it is up to the tool you paste it into.
How on-device transcription works is explained in what on-device dictation means.
What it doesn't do
- It doesn't dictate code. There is no syntax mode; say what you want and let the agent write it.
- It doesn't control your editor or run commands by voice.
- Text appears when you release the key, not word by word while you speak.
- Mac only: Apple Silicon Mac · macOS 14 Sonoma or later. It speaks 21 European languages, not every language.
Coming from a cloud tool? Compare Dictate vs Wispr Flow.
Questions
Can I dictate prompts into Claude Code in the terminal?
Yes. Dictate pastes the text at your cursor, so it works in Terminal, iTerm2, Ghostty, the VS Code terminal or any other app that accepts a paste. It doesn't press Return, so you can read the prompt before you send it.
Does Dictate write code for me?
No. Dictate turns speech into ordinary text; it has no mode for brackets, indentation or symbols. It is for the prose around code: prompts, commit messages, review comments, issue descriptions and chat.
How do I stop it mishearing "Claude Code" and my project names?
Add a substitution once. Dictate ships with the example "clawed code" → "Claude Code", and you can add your own, such as the way it hears your repo, framework or teammate's name. Substitutions match whole words, ignore case, and apply to every dictation after.
Doesn’t Claude Code have voice input already?
Yes: Claude Code's /voice command dictates into its prompt, and Anthropic's documentation says it “streams your recorded audio to Anthropic's servers for transcription”; it needs a Claude.ai sign-in. Dictate transcribes on your Mac instead, and works the same in Claude Code, Cursor, your editor and every other app.
Does my prompt get sent anywhere?
Not by Dictate. Speech is transcribed on your Mac and nothing is uploaded. Your prompt still reaches whichever AI tool you paste it into, under that tool's terms.
Which key should I use?
Any key you don't need for typing. Right Option is the default; many developers pick Fn on the laptop and a spare key such as F18 on a split or programmable keyboard. Dictate keeps a separate key for each keyboard and switches as you plug them in.
Dictate your next prompt
Apple Silicon Mac · macOS 14 Sonoma or later