Dictation software for ADHD
The email you have been avoiding for four days is forty seconds long.
- Nothing to open
- Say it messy
- Two-minute setup
In short
- Most of what gets avoided gets avoided at the start, not in the middle.
- Saying a thing out loud is a much smaller ask than typing a first line.
- Ums and false starts are dropped, so you can think out loud and still get clean text.
- It types where your cursor already is. No app to open, no trip to lose the task on.
There is a particular email everybody reading this recognises. It needs three sentences. It has been open in a tab since Monday. Nothing about it is difficult, and it is still Thursday and it is still not sent.
Said out loud, it takes about forty seconds. That gap — four days against forty seconds — is not about typing speed. It is that starting has a cost, and typing a first line is where that cost gets charged.
Talking charges less. You hold a key, say the three sentences the way you would say them to the person, let go, and it is written.
Step one
Hold one key
Wherever your cursor already is. Nothing to open, nothing to switch to, nothing to find.
Step two
Say it however it comes out
Half-sentences, restarts, thinking out loud. No punctuation spoken, no pausing.
Step three
Let go
Clean, punctuated text, in your words, exactly where you were.
Your thinking is faster than your hands
Comfortable typing is about 40 words a minute. Comfortable talking is about 150. That is not a productivity statistic here, it is why the end of the sentence keeps disappearing: you are holding a whole thought in your head while your hands deal with the first six words of it.
At talking speed the sentence lands about as fast as it arrived, so there is much less to hold. The thought that used to evaporate somewhere around the second clause tends to make it to the full stop.
40 a minute
Typing speed. Everything you thought of has to wait its turn behind your hands.
150 a minute
Talking speed. Close enough to thinking speed that less of it gets dropped.
Nothing to hold
The sentence goes out as it arrives instead of queueing in your head.
Say it messy on purpose
The usual advice is to get a rough version down and fix it afterwards, and the reason people do not is that the fixing never happens. A messy first draft is a second job you have given yourself.
Here the mess comes out on its own. Ums, false starts, the “no wait, actually” halfway through — dropped. Punctuation and capitals go in. Everything else is exactly what you said. So thinking out loud produces something you can send, not something you have to come back to.
What it will not do is reorganise your argument or improve your sentences. It tidies how you said it, not what you said.
Nothing to open
This sounds like a small thing and is not. Any tool that needs you to switch to it, dictate into a box and copy the result back has put two extra steps between you and the task, and somewhere in those two steps the task gets lost — usually in a browser tab that was open for a different reason.
There is no window here. Your cursor is already in the reply, the ticket, the message. Hold the key and the words appear in it.
To dan@harlow.io
Subject Re: Monday
Sorry for the slow reply. Monday works, and I’ll bring the figures with me.
Idea before I lose it: put the pricing switch above the tiers, not below them.
Call notes: they want it by the 14th, and legal needs a look first.
What this does not do
It will not make you want to do the task. It does not remind you the task exists, it does not organise anything, and it is not a treatment for anything.
All it does is make one specific job — turning a thought into written words — much smaller than it was. That happens to be the job sitting in front of a lot of avoided tasks.
60 minutes free, no card. Enough to clear the backlog that has been open since Monday.
60 minutes free · no card
Everywhere you already write
JotMic types at your cursor, the same as a keyboard does. Nothing to integrate, no plugin to install. If there is a text box, it works.
Plus Outlook, Word, Teams and every other app on your Mac or PC.
Better than what came with your computer
Windows and macOS both include dictation. The one that matters here is that they stop after a pause — which is the worst possible moment when you are mid-thought and the thought is already moving. They also leave the punctuation to you and never learn your words.
Stops after a pause
Cuts out mid-thought, and restarting it is exactly when you lose the thread.
Punctuation is yours
Either you say it out loud, or you add it afterwards at the keyboard.
Forgets your words
However many times you correct the same name, it never learns it.
Setup takes about two minutes
Download it, allow the microphone, pick a key. No voice training, nothing to read aloud, no configuration to get lost in. It works from the first sentence, which is the only way a tool like this ever gets used twice.
Read next
Dyslexia
When spelling interrupts the sentence, and you write around the word instead.
Dysgraphia
When getting letters down takes the attention the sentence needed.
Voice commands
Saying what you want the Mac to do instead of going to find the menu.
Questions
How does dictation help with ADHD?
It makes starting cheaper. Opening a blank reply and typing a first line is a much bigger ask than saying the thing out loud, and most of what gets avoided is avoided at the start rather than in the middle. It does not make you want to do the task. It makes the task smaller.
My thoughts run ahead of my typing. Does that help or hurt?
It helps here. Most people type around 40 words a minute and talk at about 150, which is much closer to the speed the thought arrived at. You lose less of the end of a sentence while dealing with the start of it.
What if I ramble and change direction halfway through?
Say it anyway. Ums and false starts are dropped, so you can think out loud and still get clean text. What you cannot do is have it reorganise your ideas — it tidies the delivery, not the argument.
Will it change my words?
No. Filler comes out, punctuation and capitals go in, everything else stays exactly as you said it. You can turn the cleanup off and take the raw transcript instead.
Do I have to open an app first?
No, and that is the point. It types where your cursor already is, so there is no window to find, nothing to copy, and no trip to a second app on the way — which is where a task usually gets lost.
Do I have to say the punctuation?
No. Full stops, commas, question marks and capitals come from the way you talk. You never say "comma".
Can I use it for notes and half-thoughts rather than emails?
That is what a lot of people use it for. Anything that is quicker said than typed: a thought before it goes, a summary straight after a call, the three things you have to do tomorrow.
Will it spell names and jargon right?
Add them to your vocabulary once and they stay right. Fewer corrections means fewer chances to get pulled off the thing you were doing.
Does it work in the apps I use?
It types where your cursor is, so anything with a text box works. Email, Slack, Notion, Docs, your browser, a form. Nothing to set up per app.
Is it better than the dictation built into my computer?
The built-in ones stop after a pause, which is the worst possible failure when the thought is already moving. They also leave the punctuation to you and never learn your words. For a sentence or two they are fine, and they are free.
Do I have to train it on my voice?
No. No setup and nothing to read aloud first. Install it, pick a key, and talk — the whole thing is about two minutes, deliberately.
Is this a treatment for ADHD?
No, and it would be a strange thing to claim. It is a way to write with your voice instead of your hands. It does not diagnose or treat anything and it is not a substitute for any kind of care.
What does it cost to try?
60 minutes of dictation, free, no card. Enough to clear a backlog and see whether it sticks.
60 minutes free on both engines, no card. Two minutes to set up, and nothing to read aloud.
60 minutes free · no card