# Dictato

> Offline dictation for Apple Silicon Macs with on-device cleanup

Dictato is a menu bar dictation app for Apple Silicon Macs. Hold a hotkey, speak, and proofread text is pasted at the cursor, with punctuation, paragraphs and number formatting applied by models that run on the Mac. Four speech engines are available, and profiles switch tone, language and engine per app or website. It is sold as a one-time lifetime license after a 7-day trial, with no account, cloud service or usage limit.

- **Category:** Voice Dictation
- **Made by:** Obsidian IT Consulting SRL
- **Website:** https://dicta.to
- **Runs on:** macOS
- **Facts last checked:** Oct 6, 2026

## Pricing

Dictato is a paid product with a free trial, starting at €19.99 one-time, VAT included, for one Mac at a time.

- **Pricing model:** Free trial
- **Free plan:** None.
- **Free trial:** 7-day free trial of the full app with no credit card; purchases have a 14-day refund.

| Plan | Price | What you get |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Dictato | €19.99 one-time payment, one Mac at a time | Lifetime license with all four engines, proofreading, tones, translation, profiles and updates. VAT is included, and the license can move Macs up to 3 times per 30 days. |

Read from https://dicta.to/ on Oct 6, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with Dictato before buying.

## Ways to pay less

- **One-time lifetime license for €19.99** (Lifetime license): A single payment of 19.99 € including VAT buys a lifetime license with updates and no renewal. It follows a 7-day free trial and carries a 14-day refund. Source: https://dicta.to/

## Key features

- **Hold-to-talk dictation at the cursor:** Hold a hotkey, or tap to toggle, and the finished text is pasted wherever the cursor is in any app that accepts a paste. Recording continues until the key is released, with no time limit.
- **On-device proofreading:** Punctuation, capitals, paragraph breaks and filler words are handled before the text is pasted, and dates, times and amounts are formatted, so a spoken amount comes out as 25 €.
- **Four speech engines:** Parakeet covers 24 mostly European languages, Whisper covers 99 and Qwen3 covers 26, while Apple SpeechAnalyzer is used on macOS 26 with Apple Intelligence. Dictato picks a default for the Mac.
- **Profiles per app and website:** Rules set the tone, language and engine for each app, and for individual websites in Safari, Chrome, Brave, Edge, Arc, Vivaldi and Opera. Nine tones are built in, and custom ones can be written.
- **Tone rewrites, translation and vocabulary:** Tones rewrite a dictation as an email, note or list using a Gemma model stored on the Mac. Auto-translate uses Apple's Translation framework, and a vocabulary plus voice commands fix names and jargon.
- **Local history with audio:** Each dictation is kept on the Mac with its audio, the raw transcript and the cleaned text, and can be searched in full or replayed. History is never synced and can be switched off.

## Good for

- Mac users who want dictation that never leaves the device
- Buyers who prefer a low one-time price to a subscription
- People who switch language or tone between apps and websites

## Worth knowing

- It runs only on Apple Silicon Macs with macOS 14 or later; Intel Macs are not supported and there are no Windows or mobile apps.
- It is live dictation only and does not transcribe existing audio files.
- A license covers one Mac at a time, with up to 3 moves per 30 days, and the price is listed in euros only.
- Auto-translate needs macOS 26, and tone rewrites need a one-time 3.4 GB model download.

**Tags:** Dictation, AI features, Works offline, Local-first, One-time purchase, Menu bar app

## Alternatives

- [VoiceInk](https://toolgpa.com/tools/voiceink): Open-source Mac dictation with local models and a one-time price. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/dictato-vs-voiceink)
- [Superwhisper](https://toolgpa.com/tools/superwhisper): Voice-to-text app with offline models and custom AI modes. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/dictato-vs-superwhisper)
- [Wispr Flow](https://toolgpa.com/tools/wispr-flow): Voice dictation that cleans up your speech in any app. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/dictato-vs-wispr-flow)
- [MacWhisper](https://toolgpa.com/tools/macwhisper): Mac transcription and dictation app that runs models locally. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/dictato-vs-macwhisper)
- [FluidVoice](https://toolgpa.com/tools/fluidvoice): Free, open-source on-device dictation for macOS. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/dictato-vs-fluidvoice)

## Sources

The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Oct 6, 2026:

- https://dicta.to/
- https://dicta.to/terms/

Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/dictato
Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).