Reference
Every Mac dictation app, and what it actually costs
One table, kept current, covering the whole category — including the free ones and the ones that cost more than we do. Last checked 18 August 2026.
The short answer
Mac dictation apps run from free to $249. Several are genuinely free, most of them open source. The subscriptions run $4.90–$15 a month; the one-time apps cluster at $14–$59. Voz is the cheapest thing here that is not free, at $2.99.
We make one of these, so read the table rather than our opinion. It is sorted by price, and the figures come from each vendor's own published pricing.
| App | Price | Payment model | Where audio is processed | Platforms |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Voz Whisper | $2.99 once | One-time | On device only | macOS 13+ |
| Handy | Free | Open source (MIT) | On device | macOS, Windows, Linux |
| OpenWhispr | Free | Open source (MIT) | On device, or cloud if you opt in | macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS |
| Spokenly | Free on device · $9.99/mo Pro | Freemium | On device, or cloud on Pro | macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS |
| Whisper Notes | Free to 5,000 words/wk · $14 once | Freemium, then one-time | On device | macOS, Apple Silicon only |
| Scryb | $19 once | One-time | On device | macOS |
| VoiceInk | $25 once, 1 Mac · $39 for 2 · $49 for 3 | One-time, per device / open source | On device | macOS 14.4+, Apple Silicon |
| VoxTap | $29 once | One-time | On device | macOS |
| SpeakMac | $29 once | One-time | On device | macOS |
| MacWhisper | $29–$59 once | One-time | On device | macOS |
| EmberType | $39 once | One-time | On device | macOS 14+, Apple Silicon |
| Voibe | $4.90/mo · $99 lifetime | Subscription or lifetime | On device | macOS |
| Superwhisper | $84.99/yr · $249 lifetime | Subscription or lifetime | On device or cloud | macOS, Windows, iOS |
| Wispr Flow | $15/mo · $12/mo annual | Subscription | Cloud | macOS, Windows, iOS, Android |
How to read this
Subscription or one-time is the real decision. At the annual rate, Wispr Flow costs $144 a year. Over five years that is $720, against $249 once for Superwhisper's lifetime licence or $29 for most of the one-time apps. Subscriptions buy you continuous model improvements and cloud processing; one-time apps buy you a thing you own.
Cloud or on-device is the other one. Everything in this table except Wispr Flow can transcribe without a network connection, because they run a Whisper model on your Mac's own chip. That is a privacy property and a latency property at the same time: no round trip means no waiting for one.
Free is a real answer. Handy is MIT-licensed and costs nothing, and VoiceInk can be built from source for nothing. If your budget is zero, those are the honest recommendations and we are not going to pretend otherwise.
What the price does not tell you
- Model size. Apps bundling larger Whisper models are more accurate on accents, jargon and noise. Voz ships the base model, which keeps the download at 147 MB and is the trade behind the price.
- Dictation or transcription. MacWhisper is built for transcribing files; most of the rest type at your cursor while you speak. They are different jobs.
- Setup cost. Some apps require choosing and downloading a model before first use. Others are ready on launch.
- Language coverage ranges from a handful to 100+.
Our stake in this
Voz Whisper is the $2.99 row. We built this table because nobody had made a neutral one and every existing comparison was written by a vendor arguing for itself — which is exactly what you should suspect us of too. So: the prices are linked to their sources, several apps here are cheaper or free, and if we have a competitor's price wrong we want the correction.
Checked 14 September 2026. Sources: Each vendor's published pricing page.
Voz is an independent product and is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by any other product named on this page. Product names and trademarks belong to their respective owners, and are used here only to identify what is being compared. Prices and features are as published by each vendor and checked on 14 September 2026; they change. If something here is out of date or wrong, tell us — we would rather correct this page than defend it.