Speak
Speak is a small menu bar app for Mac that turns your voice into text without the internet. It records from your microphone, transcribes everything on your computer (no internet required), and types in the result wherever your cursor is.
Download for macOS (Apple Silicon only): Speak-0.2.1.dmg
Privacy
Speak is built for local, offline transcription. Your audio and the resulting text stay on your Mac. The app doesn’t need to collect or send any data for any feature to work.
What it does
You start and stop recording with a keyboard shortcut or from the menu bar icon. Speak plays a short sound when the mic turns on or off. It uses a built-in transcription engine that runs entirely on your Mac, so nothing has to be sent to the cloud. When you stop recording, the text is pasted into the app you have in focus.
How it works
The menu bar icon is green when Speak is idle and turns red while you’re recording. Double-tap the [Option] key to start recording, and then again when you're ready to stop recording. The app will transcribe your audio and paste the text into whichever app is in focus.
Defaults
Speak comes bundled with Parakeet v3, a medium-sized English model tuned for speed. By default, the hotkey to activate Speak is double-tapping the [Option] key.
Permissions
Speak will ask for two permissions. It needs Microphone to capture your voice. It needs Accessibility so it can respond to your hotkey and paste text into other apps.
Limitations
You’ll need to grant the permissions above for full functionality. The app is larger than a typical menu bar utility because it includes the transcription model. How fast transcription runs depends on your Mac.