Mac dictation commands
Short answer: Mac dictation commands are spoken words that insert punctuation, symbols and formatting as you dictate. You say "comma" for a comma, "new paragraph" to break the text, "all caps" to shout a word, "at sign" for @. What they do not do is edit or navigate: commands like "delete that" or "select word" are not part of Dictation at all, they belong to Voice Control, a separate macOS feature. This page sorts the two out, gives you a grouped command table you can scan, and shows where a modern speech model lets you skip the commands entirely. It sits alongside the wider guide to on-device dictation on a Mac.
The command list, grouped
Apple Dictation listens for the name of a mark or an action and types the symbol or applies the formatting instead of writing the words. The most useful commands group into a handful of categories. Apple keeps the complete reference, including the full math, currency and IP-symbol set, on its commands for dictating text support page.
| Category | You say | You get |
|---|---|---|
| Formatting | new line | Starts a new line |
| Formatting | new paragraph | Starts a new paragraph |
| Formatting | tab key | Inserts a tab |
| Formatting | no space on … no space off | Stops, then resumes, automatic spacing |
| Capitalization | caps on | Applies title case to the words that follow |
| Capitalization | all caps | Makes the next word uppercase |
| Capitalization | all caps on | Makes everything that follows uppercase |
| Symbols | at sign | @ |
| Symbols | ampersand | & |
| Symbols | hashtag | # |
| Symbols | percent sign | % |
| Symbols | dollar sign | $ |
| Symbols | euro sign | € |
| Symbols | plus sign / minus sign | + − |
| Symbols | copyright sign | © |
| Symbols | trademark sign | ™ |
| Emoticons | smiley face | :-) |
| Punctuation | comma | , |
| Punctuation | period / full stop | . |
| Punctuation | question mark | ? |
| Punctuation | apostrophe | ’ |
A couple of these reward a closer look. The capitalization commands behave differently from each other: "caps on" applies title case to the run of words that follow, while "all caps" forces the next word into uppercase and "all caps on" keeps everything uppercase until you stop it. The "no space" pair is the one people forget exists, and it is the cleanest way to dictate a string like a file name or a code token without Dictation wedging spaces between the parts.
Punctuation has its own list
Punctuation is the largest single category of Dictation commands, so it gets its own page rather than a row or two here. The short version is that you can say almost any mark by name, "comma", "period" or "full stop", "question mark", "colon", "open parenthesis", "quote" and so on, and on a supported language a modern Mac adds commas, periods and question marks for you automatically while you speak.
For the complete mark-by-mark table, how auto-punctuation works, and how to turn it off, see the dedicated walkthrough on dictating punctuation on a Mac. The rest of this page stays on the broader command set: the formatting, capitalization and symbol commands above, and the line nobody draws clearly, which is where Dictation stops and Voice Control begins.
Dictation commands vs Voice Control
Here is the distinction most command listicles miss. Apple Dictation only puts text into a document: words, punctuation, symbols and formatting. It has no idea how to edit what is already there. So when you say "delete that" expecting the last sentence to vanish, Dictation types the words "delete that", because deleting is not something it does.
Editing and navigating by voice, deleting a word, selecting a sentence, moving the cursor up, correcting a mistake, are the job of Voice Control, a separate macOS accessibility feature you switch on in System Settings under Accessibility. Voice Control is built for hands-free operation of the whole machine rather than only inserting text, which is why the editing vocabulary lives there. It is also where custom commands live: Voice Control lets you author your own spoken commands, while Dictation has no command authoring at all.
| Feature | What it does | Custom commands? |
|---|---|---|
| Dictation | Inserts text plus punctuation, symbols and formatting by spoken command. No editing or navigation. | No |
| Voice Control | Operates the Mac hands-free: edit, select, delete, move the cursor, open apps, click. Includes dictating text too. | Yes |
The practical takeaway: if your search for a command came up empty in Dictation, check whether it is actually an editing command, in which case you want Voice Control. If you are setting Dictation up for the first time and want the keyboard side of it sorted, the steps live in the guide to getting dictation working on a Mac, and the trigger key itself is covered in the note on the Mac dictation keyboard shortcut.
Skip the commands: let the model do it
There is a third option that sidesteps most of this. Parakeety runs NVIDIA’s Parakeet TDT 0.6B v3 model on the Apple Neural Engine, and that model writes punctuation and the natural shape of the text from the sentence itself. You hold the section key, talk in whole sentences, release, and the text pastes at the cursor already punctuated. There is no command grammar to memorize for punctuation, because the marks come from the model reading the sentence rather than from keywords you recite.
The honest part: spoken commands still do things a transcription model will not infer. If you need a literal @ in the middle of a word, a forced run of uppercase, or a tab character, saying "at sign", "all caps on" or "tab key" gives you that exact control, and a model writing prose will not guess it for you. So the trade is precision for flow. For per-symbol control of structured text you reach for the spoken commands; for drafting at length you let the model punctuate and fix the rare edge case by hand.
Everything Parakeety does happens on-device, so the audio never leaves your Mac and the punctuation is computed locally alongside the words. For a side-by-side look at how the model approach compares with Apple’s built-in tool on the same machine, the head-to-head on Parakeety against Apple Dictation walks through where each one wins.
FAQ
- What voice commands work with Apple Dictation?
- Apple Dictation responds to spoken commands that insert text and symbols while you talk. That covers punctuation by name ("comma", "period", "question mark"), formatting ("new line", "new paragraph", "tab key", "no space on"), capitalization ("caps on" for title case, "all caps" for uppercase), symbols ("at sign", "ampersand", "hashtag", "percent sign", "dollar sign", "copyright sign"), and emoticons such as "smiley face" for :-). On a supported language and a modern Mac, Dictation also adds commas, periods and question marks automatically as you speak. What it does not do is edit or move around: commands like "delete that" or "select word" belong to Voice Control, a separate macOS feature.
- Can I create custom dictation commands on a Mac?
- Not in Apple Dictation. Dictation has a fixed vocabulary of spoken words that insert punctuation, symbols and formatting, and there is no way to author your own. Custom commands are a Voice Control feature: in System Settings under Accessibility, Voice Control lets you add commands that run actions, open apps or insert snippets of text hands-free. So if you want to define your own spoken shortcuts, you set them up in Voice Control rather than Dictation.
- How do I start a new line or paragraph when dictating?
- Say "new line" to move the cursor to the next line, and say "new paragraph" to start a fresh paragraph with a blank line between. These are formatting commands, so Dictation acts on them rather than typing the words. Related formatting commands include "tab key" to insert a tab and "no space on" then "no space off" to stop Dictation adding spaces between words for a stretch of text.
- Why don't "delete that" or "select word" work in Dictation?
- Because they are not Dictation commands. Apple Dictation only inserts text, punctuation, symbols and formatting; it has no editing or navigation vocabulary. Deleting, selecting, moving the cursor and correcting text by voice all belong to Voice Control, a separate accessibility feature you turn on in System Settings under Accessibility. If you need hands-free editing, run Voice Control; if you just want to speak text into a document, Dictation is the tool.
Try it
Parakeety is a Mac menu-bar app. Hold the section key below Esc, talk in natural sentences, release; your words paste at the cursor already punctuated, with no commands to recite for the punctuation. Audio never leaves the machine. There is a free 7-day trial with no card required. After that it is $30 once.