# FreeFlow

> Local voice dictation for macOS. Speech becomes text in any app, entirely on-device — no cloud, no account, no subscription. $99 once, 14-day free trial.

Requires macOS 14+ on Apple Silicon. Transcription runs through WhisperKit, NVIDIA Parakeet and Cohere Transcribe CoreML models on the Neural Engine. Six models ship (Parakeet V3 484 MB recommended, 25 languages); any WhisperKit-compatible Hugging Face model can be added. One licence covers 3 Macs, updates included.

## Pages
- [Home](https://freeflow.audio/): features, pricing, FAQ
- [Comparisons](https://freeflow.audio/vs): FreeFlow against every other Mac dictation app
- [Changelog](https://freeflow.audio/changelog): what changed in every released version
- [Privacy](https://freeflow.audio/privacy): every network call the app makes
- [Terms](https://freeflow.audio/terms)

## Guides
- [Best Mac dictation apps 2026](https://freeflow.audio/best-mac-dictation-apps): every app compared by price and where audio is processed
- [Mac dictation not working](https://freeflow.audio/mac-dictation-not-working): nine fixes for Apple Dictation, and what it structurally cannot do
- [Offline dictation on a Mac](https://freeflow.audio/offline-dictation-mac): which apps genuinely work with no network

## Comparisons
- [FreeFlow vs Wispr Flow](https://freeflow.audio/vs/wispr-flow): The polished cloud one. Genuinely fast, genuinely well-made — and every word you speak goes to a server.
- [FreeFlow vs superwhisper](https://freeflow.audio/vs/superwhisper): The closest thing to a direct rival — local models, deep customisation, and a subscription attached to it.
- [FreeFlow vs Apple Dictation](https://freeflow.audio/vs/apple-dictation): Free, already installed, and on-device. Also the reason most people go looking for something else.
- [FreeFlow vs MacWhisper](https://freeflow.audio/vs/macwhisper): Excellent at transcribing files you already have. Dictation is the side of it, not the point of it.
- [FreeFlow vs Dragon](https://freeflow.audio/vs/dragon): The name everyone still searches for. Nuance discontinued it on the Mac in 2018 and never brought it back.
- [FreeFlow vs VoiceInk](https://freeflow.audio/vs/voiceink): Open source, local, one-time — the closest thing to a philosophical twin, and cheaper.
- [FreeFlow vs Aqua Voice](https://freeflow.audio/vs/aqua-voice): Cloud-only dictation with strong custom vocabulary. Nothing it does happens on your Mac.
- [FreeFlow vs Willow Voice](https://freeflow.audio/vs/willow-voice): Very fast cloud dictation with a generous free tier — and the same upload every other cloud app makes.
- [FreeFlow vs Otter.ai](https://freeflow.audio/vs/otter): A meeting transcription service, not a dictation app. Different job, frequently confused.
- [FreeFlow vs Voibe](https://freeflow.audio/vs/voibe): Local Mac dictation with a lifetime option — and an SEO operation considerably larger than its product.
- [FreeFlow vs FreeFlow by Zach Latta](https://freeflow.audio/vs/freeflow-open-source): Yes, there are two Mac dictation apps called FreeFlow. Here is which one you are looking at.

## FAQ
### Does anything I say leave my Mac?
No. A speech model running on your Mac's own chip turns your voice into text — Parakeet, Whisper or Cohere Transcribe, compiled for Apple Silicon. There's no account and no telemetry, so there's nowhere for it to go. Switch the Wi-Fi off and it keeps working.

### What does it need to run?
An Apple Silicon Mac (M1 or later) on macOS 14 or newer. Intel Macs aren't supported. The optional Apple Intelligence tidy-up needs macOS 26.

### Does it ever use the internet?
Only for four chores, and never with your voice: to download a model (Parakeet V3 is 484 MB), to activate your licence (re-checked at most every 14 days — an activated Mac stays licensed offline), for a daily update check you can switch off, and to send feedback when you choose to. The privacy page lists each one.

### What's in the free trial?
Everything, for 14 days, with no card and no account. After that, $99 once keeps it on up to three Macs, with every update included. Nothing renews.

### Can email and chat sound different?
That's what modes are for. Each mode keeps its own speech model, language, translate-to-English switch, capitalisation, filler-word removal and profanity filter — and on macOS 26 it can tidy the take with Apple Intelligence, on the Mac. Switch modes from the menu bar. Mode files are schema-compatible with superwhisper.

### Which apps can it write into?
Any app with a blinking cursor. FreeFlow pastes into whatever's in front, then puts your clipboard back the way it was — and marks the paste so polite clipboard managers skip it.

### What will it ask me to allow?
Two things: the microphone, so it can hear you, and Accessibility, so it can paste into your other apps.

### How many languages does it speak?
Parakeet V3 handles 25 European languages. Cohere Transcribe covers 14 (macOS 15 or later), and the Whisper models cover the widest range — they can also translate what you say into English as it types.

### Will it get my odd words right?
Maybe not the first time. Add them to the dictionary once — names, jargon, product words — and they come out spelled your way from then on.

### Does it work with Claude Code?
Yes. Connect it in Settings and a small card appears whenever a Claude Code session needs you. Click an answer, or hold ⌥ and say it. Permission cards stay click-only, on purpose: a misheard word should never run a command.