Voice typing on Mac
Voice typing on a Mac is Apple Dictation: you turn it on under System Settings › Keyboard › Dictation, then start it by pressing the Fn key twice and talk. That is the system-wide route that works in almost any app. Google Docs and Microsoft Word also have their own separate voice typing built into those apps, which trips a lot of people up. This page is part of the wider guide to on-device speech to text on Mac, and it sorts out the three different things people mean by voice typing, the answer for a MacBook Air or Pro, and why the built-in shortcut behaves the way it does.
How to turn on voice typing on Mac
To enable voice typing on a Mac, open the Apple menu, choose System Settings, click Keyboard in the sidebar, and turn on Dictation. Then put the cursor in a text field, press the Fn key twice, and start talking. That is the whole setup at a high level. The full walkthrough, including the microphone permission you grant the first time, is in how to dictate on a Mac, and the shortcut on its own, with the options for changing it, is covered in the Mac dictation keyboard shortcut.
One naming note worth getting straight: Apple calls this feature Dictation, not voice typing. Voice typing is the name Google Docs uses, and Word calls its version Dictate. They are three separate tools with three separate ways to start them, which is the next thing to untangle.
The three voice typing routes on a Mac
When people search for voice typing on a Mac they usually mean one of three things. Apple Dictation is the system-wide one. Google Docs has a feature literally named Voice typing that lives in the browser. Word has Dictate built into the app. Here is what each one is, where it lives, and how to start it.
| Route | Where | How to start | Works in | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Dictation | Built into macOS | Press Fn twice (after turning it on in System Settings) | Almost any text field, system-wide | Stops after about 30 seconds of silence |
| Google Docs Voice typing | In a browser, Google Docs | Tools menu › Voice typing, or Command-Shift-S | Google Docs only, Chrome recommended | Sends audio to Google to transcribe |
| Word Dictate | Inside Microsoft Word | Home tab › Dictate button | Word, and other Microsoft 365 apps | Needs a Microsoft 365 account and a connection |
Apple Dictation is the one that works everywhere, so it is the right default for most people. The other two only matter inside their own apps. If your goal is specifically the browser editor, see dictating into Google Docs; for the Microsoft side, dictating into Word covers the Dictate button. Both of those send your audio to a server to be transcribed, which is the opposite of how Apple Dictation now works and the opposite of the on-device approach further down this page.
Voice typing on a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro
There is no difference. A MacBook Air and a MacBook Pro both run macOS, so voice typing on either one is the same Apple Dictation, turned on the same way and started by the same Fn-twice shortcut. The same is true of an iMac, a Mac mini, or a Mac Studio. The model and the microphone handling live in macOS, not in a specific laptop, so a guide written for one Mac applies to all of them.
The only practical variation is the keyboard. If your MacBook has a Globe key in the bottom-left corner, you may find that pressing it twice already triggers dictation, since that is one of the built-in shortcut options. And if you have set Fn or the Globe key to do something else, such as switching input sources, you can reassign the dictation trigger to Control-twice or a custom key. That choice is in the same Keyboard settings, and it is the same on the Air and the Pro.
Why voice typing toggles instead of hold-to-talk
Apple Dictation is a toggle, not a key you hold. You press Fn twice to switch a listening session on, and it keeps running on its own until you stop it or it times out. The session ends automatically after about 30 seconds of silence, so a pause to think can cut you off mid-thought. This is by design rather than a fault, and it is the usual reason behind Apple Dictation cutting off before you are done.
The toggle model also means you manage state: start the session, talk, then remember to stop it. A hold-to-talk model removes that bookkeeping because the session is tied to the key, existing only while you hold it. I compared the two approaches in full in push-to-talk versus always-on dictation, since that difference is the whole reason I built Parakeety the way I did.
Push-to-talk voice typing: hold one key
Parakeety is voice typing built around a key you hold rather than tap. You hold the section key (§) below Esc while you talk, then release to stop, and the text pastes at the cursor in whatever app you are in. The session lasts exactly as long as you hold the key, so there is no toggle to remember and no 30-second silence timer to fight. It is the same idea as Apple Dictation, system-wide voice typing into any app, with the interaction flipped.
The reason this works is architectural. Parakeety runs NVIDIA’s Parakeet TDT 0.6B v3 model on the Apple Neural Engine, fully on-device, so the listening, the transcribing and the pasting all happen on your Mac and the audio never leaves the machine. That is a different trade from Google Docs or Word, which send audio to a server, and it is why holding a key for the length of speech is a natural fit here. If you want the broader picture of doing this locally, the page on voice to text on Mac walks through the on-device options.
FAQ
- How do I turn on voice typing on a Mac?
- Voice typing on a Mac is Apple Dictation. Open the Apple menu, choose System Settings, click Keyboard in the sidebar, then go to Dictation and turn it on. The first time you start it your Mac may download a small language pack. After that you can dictate into almost any text field. Google Docs and Microsoft Word have their own separate voice typing that you turn on inside those apps instead.
- What is the voice typing shortcut on a Mac?
- By default you press the Fn (Function) key twice to start Apple Dictation, then press Escape or Fn twice again to stop. You can change the shortcut under System Settings > Keyboard > Dictation to pressing the Globe key twice, pressing Control twice, or a custom combination. Google Docs uses Command-Shift-S for its own Voice typing, and Word has a Dictate button on the Home tab.
- How do I voice type on a MacBook Air?
- A MacBook Air uses the same Apple Dictation as every other Mac, so the steps are identical to a MacBook Pro or an iMac. Turn it on under System Settings > Keyboard > Dictation, then press the Fn key twice in any text field and start talking. There is nothing Air-specific to set up. The model and the microphone are built into macOS, not the particular laptop.
- Why does voice typing stop on my Mac?
- Apple Dictation stops automatically after about 30 seconds of silence. Each built-in shortcut starts an always-listening session rather than a hold-to-talk one, so a pause to gather your thoughts can end the session before you have finished. To avoid the cutoff you would need a push-to-talk model, where the session lasts exactly as long as you hold the key.
Try it
Parakeety is a Mac menu-bar app with one shortcut you hold rather than tap. Hold the section key, talk, release; your words paste at the cursor, and the audio never leaves your Mac. It runs on-device on Apple Silicon, macOS 14 and later. There is a free 7-day trial with no card required. After that it is $30 once.