Dictation software for dyslexia
Say it instead of spelling it. The sentence stays whole.
- Punctuation included
- Your words, unchanged
- Names spelled right
In short
- Spelling gets decided in the middle of a sentence, and the sentence pays for it.
- Talking takes the decision out. The word arrives spelled.
- Full stops, commas and capitals arrive too. You never say them out loud.
- It drops your ums and leaves everything else exactly as you said it.
The expensive part of spelling is not the spelling. It is where it happens. You are halfway through a sentence, you hit a word you are not sure of, and you stop — and the rest of the sentence, which was right there a second ago, is gone.
So most people find a way round it. You pick a word you can spell instead of the word you meant. It works, and the cost is invisible: your writing ends up smaller and flatter than your thinking, and nobody can see why, including you.
Talking does not have that step in it. You say the sentence you were going to say, all of it, and it arrives spelled.
Step one
Hold one key
Right Option on a Mac, Right Ctrl on Windows. Change it to any key you like.
Step two
Say the sentence
All of it, normally. No punctuation out loud, no pauses, no waiting for it to catch up.
Step three
Let go
Finished text lands where your cursor was, spelled and punctuated, in your words.
Spellcheck only works if you were close
Spellcheck reads what you typed and guesses what you meant. When the attempt is near the word, it is excellent. When it is not — and the words that are hardest to spell are exactly the ones you land furthest from — the suggestions are as far off as the attempt was.
Names are worse again, because there is nothing to guess from. A colleague, a town, a company, a piece of jargon from your job: spellcheck has never seen it, so it either leaves it or offers you something unrelated.
Dictation skips the whole exchange. The word comes out spelled, and the names you use get added to your vocabulary once and stay right after that.
No attempt to correct
The word arrives spelled, so there is no red line and no list of guesses.
Names stay right
Add a person, a place or a bit of jargon once. It stops being a problem.
Punctuation too
Full stops, commas and capitals come from how you talked, not from you.
It does not rewrite you
This is the bit worth being clear about. Plenty of writing tools improve your sentences. This one does not. It takes out the ums and false starts, puts in the punctuation, and leaves every other word exactly as you said it.
You can turn even that off and get the raw transcript, word for word. Nobody needs another piece of software with an opinion about how they write.
It types where your cursor is
No separate window, nothing to copy across. Click into the email, the form, the document — wherever the words are supposed to go — hold the key and talk.
To recruitment@harlow.io
Subject Application — site supervisor
Hello. I’ve attached my CV for the supervisor role. I’ve run sites of this size for eleven years and can start next month.
The second experiment used the same method but a smaller sample, which is probably why the results were less consistent.
I can pick everyone up at half seven if that helps.
What it does not do
It does not help you read. That is half the problem for a lot of people and this is not the half it touches.
The pairing worth knowing about is free and already on your computer: both Mac and Windows can read text back to you out loud. Dictate the words, have them read back, fix what sounds wrong. That loop skips the two hardest parts and it costs nothing to try.
Better than what came with your computer
Windows and macOS both include dictation. They stop after a pause, they leave most of the punctuation to you, and they never learn a name however many times you fix it. Punctuation by hand is the last thing you want to be doing here, which makes that gap a bigger deal on this page than on most.
Stops after a pause
It cuts out mid-thought and you restart it by hand.
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.
60 minutes free, no card. Enough for a week of email and a couple of the longer things you have been putting off.
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.
Setup takes about two minutes
Download it, allow the microphone, pick your key. There is no voice training and nothing to read aloud first, which matters — being asked to read a passage to a computer is a bad way to start.
Read next
Dysgraphia
When getting letters down takes the attention the sentence needed.
ADHD
The four-day email, and why saying it is easier than starting it.
Offline dictation
Dictating with the wifi off, and when that is the engine you want.
Questions
Does dictation help with dyslexia?
It takes spelling out of writing. That is the part that interrupts a sentence — you stop to work out a word, and the thought you were holding goes. Talking removes the decision, so what you write is as big as what you were thinking rather than as big as what you can spell.
Will it change my words or my style?
No. It drops ums and false starts, adds punctuation and capitals, and leaves every other word exactly as you said it. If you would rather have it completely untouched, turn the cleanup off and take the raw transcript.
Do I have to say the punctuation out loud?
No. Full stops, commas, question marks and capitals come from the way you talk. Some other tools want you to say them, which is worth checking before you pick one.
Will it spell names right?
Add them once to your vocabulary and they stay right. People, places, companies, the words your job uses. Those are usually the ones spellcheck is least help with, because it cannot guess what it has never seen.
Does it help with reading?
No, and it is worth saying plainly. It helps you get words out; it does nothing about getting words in. Both Mac and Windows can read text back to you out loud, and using that alongside dictation is a better pair than either one alone.
Is it better than spellcheck?
It is a different thing. Spellcheck works from what you typed, so if the attempt is a long way from the word, the suggestions are too. Dictation means there is no attempt to correct — the word arrives spelled.
Will it understand my accent?
It is not trained on you, so there is nothing to set up, and it handles most accents well. It also works in over 25 languages and works out which one you are speaking rather than making you choose.
Does it work in the apps I use?
It types where your cursor is, so anything with a text box works. Email, Word, Google Docs, Slack, forms in your browser, a job application. Nothing to set up per app.
Is it better than the dictation built into my computer?
The built-in ones stop after a pause, leave most of the punctuation to you, and never learn your words. Punctuation is the thing you least want to be adding by hand, so that gap matters more here than usual. For a sentence or two they are fine, and they are free.
Can I use it for coursework or an application form?
It types into whatever you are filling in, so yes. Whether a piece of assessed work allows it is a question for the school, university or employer setting it — that rule is theirs, not ours.
Do I have to train it on my voice?
No. No setup, nothing to read aloud first — which matters, because reading a passage aloud to a computer is exactly the wrong first task here.
What does it cost to try?
60 minutes of dictation, free, no card. Enough to write a week of email and a couple of longer things.
60 minutes free on both engines, no card. Nothing to set up, nothing to read aloud.
60 minutes free · no card