Hold a key. Say it.
Watch it get typed.
Flow is free hold-to-talk dictation for macOS. Hold Right-Option, say what you mean, and let go: clean, punctuated text lands at your cursor in whatever app you're in. Speech recognition runs entirely on your Mac.
How it works
Three moves. That's the whole app.
Hold Right-Option
In any app, with your cursor anywhere you can type. A small "listening" pill fades in so you always know the mic is hot.
Say what you mean
Talk naturally. Apple's on-device speech engine transcribes as you go. Nothing is recorded to disk and nothing leaves your Mac.
Let go
Flow drops the "um"s, turns "period" and "new line" into punctuation, fixes capitalization, and types the result at your cursor.
Features
Dictation that respects your Mac.
100% on-device
Transcription uses Apple's built-in Speech framework. No cloud round-trip, no API key, no audio ever uploaded anywhere.
Works in every app
Mail, Slack, Notes, your browser, your code editor. If the cursor blinks there, Flow types there.
Cleans up after you
Filler words dropped, spacing fixed, sentences capitalized. What lands is text you'd actually send.
Spoken punctuation
Say "period", "comma", "question mark", "new line", or "new paragraph" and get the real thing.
Personal dictionary
Recognizer keeps hearing "print of oh"? Map it to "Printavo" once and it's fixed in every future dictation.
Voice snippets
Say a trigger phrase, get a full expansion. "My sign off" can become your entire email signature.
History & insights
Every transcript saved locally, with total words, average WPM, your day streak, and which apps you dictate into most.
Clipboard-safe
Flow inserts via a paste that clipboard managers ignore, then restores whatever you had copied. Your clipboard is untouched.
Free and open source
MIT licensed. Read every line of code, build it yourself, or grab the download. No trial, no upsell.
Install
Up and running in a minute.
Flow is free and open source, not notarized through Apple's paid developer program. That means macOS shows a scary-looking warning on first launch. It's a 20 second detour, and there are two ways through it.
Option 1: Terminal install, no warnings at all
Paste this one line into Terminal (find it in Applications > Utilities). It downloads Flow, puts it in Applications, clears the safety flag, and launches it.
Option 2: Download normally, then approve it once
- Download and unzip. Hit the download button up top to get Flow.zip. Double-click it. You get Flow.app.
- Drag Flow.app into Applications.
- Open it. You'll see the warning shown here. Click Done. Not "Move to Trash". This is macOS being cautious about any app that isn't in its paid developer registry, not a malware detection.
- Approve it in System Settings. Open System Settings, go to Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom Security section. You'll see "Flow was blocked to protect your Mac", exactly as pictured here. Click Open Anyway, then confirm.
- Grant the three permissions Flow asks for. Microphone (to hear you), Speech Recognition (Apple's on-device engine), and Accessibility (to watch for the hold-to-talk key and type the result). Each is a one-time prompt.
- Done. Look for the waveform icon in your menu bar. Put your cursor in any text field, hold Right-Option, and say something. The warning never comes back.
./build.sh.
Cheat sheet
Everything Flow responds to.
| Action | What happens |
|---|---|
| Hold Right-Option | Recording starts; the listening pill appears |
| Release Right-Option | Recording stops; cleaned-up text is typed at your cursor |
| Toggle key (optional) | Press once to start, again to stop. Right Command or F13 to F19, set in Settings |
| Say "period", "comma", "question mark" | The punctuation mark, correctly spaced |
| Say "new line" / "new paragraph" | A line break / a blank line |
| Say a dictionary "heard" phrase | Replaced with your correction before cleanup |
| Say a snippet trigger | Replaced with its full expansion after cleanup |
| Menu bar > Paste Last Transcript | Types your most recent dictation again at the cursor |
| Menu bar > Open Flow | History, Insights, Dictionary, Snippets, Settings |
FAQ
Questions people ask.
Is it really free?
Yes. Free forever, MIT licensed, no trial, no locked features, no account. It was built to replace a subscription dictation app and is shared in that same spirit.
Does my voice go to the cloud?
No. Flow uses Apple's Speech framework with on-device recognition. Audio is transcribed on your Mac and discarded; it is never written to disk and never uploaded. The transcripts in your history live in a local folder only you can read.
macOS says it "could not verify" Flow. Is that bad?
It's normal and expected for free apps. Apple shows that message for any app whose developer doesn't pay for the $99/year Apple Developer Program, and since Flow is free, that fee isn't happening. Nothing harmful was detected; Apple simply doesn't have the developer in its paid registry. Click Done in the warning, then System Settings, Privacy & Security, scroll to the bottom, Open Anyway. You do this exactly once. The Terminal install option skips the warning entirely, and the full source is on GitHub if you want to verify what the app does yourself.
Why does it need Accessibility permission?
Two reasons: watching for the Right-Option hold (a global key event, which macOS only exposes to apps you've granted Accessibility) and typing the finished text into the frontmost app. Flow uses that permission for exactly those two things; the code that does it is about a hundred lines you can read on GitHub.
How is this different from macOS built-in dictation?
Built-in dictation makes you go find the shortcut, shows raw output with the filler words left in, and stops listening when it feels like it. Flow is push-to-talk like a walkie-talkie: hold the key, talk, release, done. It cleans the text before typing it, applies your personal dictionary and snippets, and keeps a searchable local history with stats.
How is this different from Wispr Flow?
Same interaction, different philosophy. Wispr Flow is a polished commercial product that sends your audio to its servers for transcription and charges a subscription. This Flow is a small native Swift app: transcription stays on your Mac, there is nothing to sign up for, and it costs nothing. If you want cloud-grade accuracy and don't mind the trade, Wispr is great. If you want private, free, and instant, that's this.
What languages does it support?
Whatever your Mac's speech recognition supports for your system language. Flow asks Apple's engine for your current locale; changing your macOS dictation language changes what Flow hears.
Where does my stuff live?
Everything (history, dictionary, snippets, settings) is plain JSON in ~/Library/Application Support/Flow. Nothing ever leaves your Mac, and deleting that folder resets the app completely.
How do I uninstall?
Quit Flow from its menu bar icon, delete Flow.app from Applications, and remove the ~/Library/Application Support/Flow folder. That's everything.
Can I build it from source?
Yes. Clone the repo, run ./build.sh, and open dist/Flow.app. You need the Xcode Command Line Tools, nothing else. The whole app is a small Swift package, and HOW_TO_BUILD.md in the repo walks through how every piece works.
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A text expander for your Mac. Type /sig anywhere and get your whole signature: rich text, images, and dynamic dates included. Free and open source too.
Stop typing everything twice as slow.
Download Flow, freemacOS 13 or later. Universal for Apple Silicon and Intel.