voice2text

Local, MLX-first voice-to-text. Hold Right ⌘, talk, release — it transcribes with Parakeet, cleans the text up with a small local LLM, and pastes at your cursor. No cloud or account; after the one-time model download, it runs without a network connection.

Voice-to-text tools like Wispr Flow, MacWhisper, and VoiceInk are great until the network gets in the way — Wispr Flow isn't compatible with most VPNs, so behind a corporate SSL-intercepting gateway (Zscaler and friends) it stalls or fails. Once the models are cached, going local makes that whole class of problem disappear: the VPN is irrelevant. Speech models are good enough now that the basics fit in a small Python package on consumer hardware.

Heritage: this started as a single voice2text.py under 300 lines — that proof-of-concept is preserved forever at the nano tag. From 0.3.0 it's a small, modular package: pluggable MLX backends, one config file, a benchmark harness, and an optional one-file menu-bar app.

Design tenet — be communicative. An ergonomic tool is an expressive one: every action gets immediate, visible feedback. The optional menu-bar icon tracks live state (off · loading · ready · recording · transcribing · cleaning · error), so you always know whether the tool heard you.

What you get

• Push-to-talk — hold Right ⌘ (configurable), release to transcribe + paste. Double-tap for hands-free, tap again to stop.
• Parakeet (MLX) transcription by default — ~10× faster than Whisper on Apple Silicon, English + 24 European languages. Whisper stays available as a fallback for rare languages/accents.
• In-process LLM cleanup via mlx-lm (Qwen3.5-2B) — punctuation and fillers, keeping 98% of your words on a 208-dictation benchmark. No Ollama, no daemon. Casual or strict. (Ollama optional — see Cleanup engine.)
• Pastes at cursor, restoring your previous clipboard.
• File transcription — v2t transcribe memo.opus runs the same local models over audio you already have (see Transcribing files).
• One config file at ~/.v2t/config.toml, plus a SQLite history of every transcription: text, timings, and which microphone at what level.
• Optional one-file Swift menu — native permissions, instant state, and quick links; no window or Xcode project.

Install

Requires macOS on Apple Silicon (MLX). Parakeet transcription and in-process mlx-lm cleanup ship as dependencies, with no daemon. The models download from Hugging Face on first launch, then remain in the local cache:

uv tool install voice2text   # Parakeet STT + in-process Qwen3.5 cleanup
v2t setup                    # optional: pick models, detect Ollama, write config
v2t

The optional menu-bar app (the identity that holds the Microphone and Accessibility grants) comes prebuilt, signed with Developer ID and notarised, so it also installs on a Mac with no Apple signing identity, such as a managed work laptop:

brew tap lucharo/voice2text https://github.com/lucharo/voice2text.git
brew install --cask voice2text   # /Applications/Voice2Text.app; the engine above stays separate

Prefer Whisper for transcription? Add the extra (quote the brackets — zsh treats them as globs):

uv tool install 'voice2text[whisper]'   # adds the Whisper backend; select it in config

# quick try (fresh venv each run — slower startup)
uvx --from voice2text v2t

# pip
pip install voice2text && v2t

# from source
git clone https://github.com/lucharo/voice2text.git && cd voice2text
uv sync --no-dev && uv run v2t

Usage

v2t                      # run push-to-talk (casual cleanup, parakeet)
v2t --strict             # heavier cleanup: restructures, drops false starts
v2t --no-cleanup         # paste raw transcription, skip the LLM
v2t --backend whisper    # use the whisper backend for this run
v2t --pause-music        # pause media while recording (needs nowplaying-cli)
v2t --streaming-mode off # decode after release instead of while the hotkey is held

v2t transcribe memo.opus # transcribe a file you already have (no microphone)

v2t setup                # guided config: pick models, detect Ollama
v2t history              # last 10 transcriptions; `v2t history <term>` searches, --raw, --json
v2t dictionary           # names/jargon to spell right; `add`, `import-wispr`
v2t status               # running / idle (also used by the menu app)
v2t stop                 # stop a running v2t gracefully  (--force if it is stuck)
v2t config               # show resolved config + paths  (--init writes a template)
v2t menubar install      # optional: compile + open the tiny native menu app (or brew install --cask voice2text)
v2t service install      # optional: start that menu app at login

Hold Fn (the 🌐 key, bottom-left) to record, release to transcribe and paste. The microphone opens on the press, but nothing shows until the key has been down for half a second, so a short tap or a shortcut that happens to include the key (Fn+arrow) leaves no trace. For longer dictations, double-tap Fn: it keeps recording hands-free until you tap it once more, like Wispr Flow's double-Escape. key = "cmd_r" under [hotkey] brings back Right Command.

For Fn to be free, System Settings → Keyboard → Press 🌐 key to must be Do Nothing. Change it in that pane: defaults write com.apple.HIToolbox AppleFnUsageType -int 0 writes the same value but running apps keep the old one until you log out and in, so a tap still opens the emoji picker. v2t warns in the log while the stored value is not 0.

Transcribing files

v2t transcribe points the same local models at audio already on disk — anything ffmpeg reads (.opus, .m4a, .mp3, video files too), no microphone or permissions involved.

v2t transcribe memo.opus              # prints the transcript, copies it to the clipboard
v2t transcribe memo.opus > notes.txt  # redirected: clean text, no clipboard copy
v2t transcribe *.m4a                  # several files, each under a `# filename` heading
v2t transcribe --clean memo.opus      # add the LLM cleanup pass (--casual / --strict imply it)

Files transcribe verbatim by default: cleanup rewrites, and that is rarely what you want for someone else's voice note. Every step reports live elapsed time — a 3½-minute WhatsApp note takes about 11s with Parakeet on an M1 Max (~19× realtime). Each result is appended to the same history as your dictations, with the file it came from (save_history = false to opt out).

Strict vs Casual

Casual (default) only adds punctuation and removes "um/uh", keeping your phrasing. Strict also removes fillers and restructures for clarity; it is the opinionated mode, and with a small model it can over-edit, which is why it is no longer the default.

Either way, long dictations are cleaned in sentence-aligned chunks of about 120 words, and any chunk whose cleaned length drifts outside 75–130% of the raw chunk (60–130% in strict) is pasted raw instead. Cleanup may punctuate; it may not drop or invent content.

Both modes send the model a short system prompt plus these worked examples as prior turns, so even a small model treats your dictation as text to clean rather than a question to answer.

History

Every dictation and file transcription is one row in ~/.v2t/history/history.sqlite, table transcriptions: raw and cleaned text, models and timings, how it was triggered (hold, latched, file), the input device it was recorded from, its level (rms, peak, zero_frac, and loud_frac, the share of the recording with speech-level sound), cleanup chunk stats, dictionary replacements fired, and the outcome. Failed dictations are rows too (outcome = 'error: …'), so a dead microphone shows up next to the device that produced it. Read it back without opening the database:

v2t history                 # the last 10, oldest first, with timings
v2t history -n 3 --raw      # show the raw transcription next to the cleaned one
v2t history standup         # entries whose raw or clean text mentions "standup"
v2t history --json -n 0     # every row as JSON lines, for jq and friends
sqlite3 ~/.v2t/history/history.sqlite "select ts, device, loud_frac, outcome from transcriptions order by id desc limit 5"

A pre-existing transcriptions.jsonl is imported into the database the first time it is opened, and lines an older, still-running v2t appends afterwards are picked up on the next open; the file itself is left alone. When a dictation carries almost no speech-level sound (a Bluetooth headset whose link never opened, a virtual device), the text is still pasted, but the log, a macOS notification and the warning field of v2t status name the device and the level.

The menu-bar app shows the last transcription too, with a Copy Last Transcription action for when the paste landed in the wrong window.

Dictionary

Names, products and jargon the recogniser gets wrong go in ~/.v2t/dictionary.txt, one per line. Plain terms are shown to the cleanup model, which is told to spell them exactly like that when it sees a similar-sounding word. heard => written lines are exact, case-insensitive replacements applied after cleanup (and with --no-cleanup), so they work even with the LLM off.

v2t dictionary                       # list
v2t dictionary add Parakeet          # a term
v2t dictionary add "whisper flow => Wispr Flow"
v2t dictionary import-wispr          # merge Wispr Flow's dictionary from its local database
v2t dictionary apply transcript.txt  # run the replacements over a transcript; stderr says which fired

apply reads stdin when no file is given, so a new heard => written line can be proven against the raw text that prompted it before the next dictation.

Startup time

Both models load from the Hugging Face cache without contacting the hub once they are there, so a warm start is about 2 s. On a slow or blocked network the hub's revision checks alone used to cost 45 s for Parakeet and 19 s for the cleanup model; the first download still needs a connection.

Config — ~/.v2t/

Everything lives in one directory (override with $V2T_HOME, or $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/v2t):

~/.v2t/
  config.toml                    # all settings (v2t config --init to create)
  history/history.sqlite         # every transcription + metadata, one row each (toggle in config)
  run/                           # private runtime status + log
  run/last-recording.wav         # the last dictation's audio, replaced every time (toggle in config)

config.toml (every key optional — these are the defaults):

[transcription]
backend = "parakeet"   # parakeet (MLX) | whisper
model = ""             # blank = backend default
streaming_mode = "hacky"  # hacky (default): transcribe while the hotkey is held, parakeet only | off

[cleanup]
enabled = true
engine = "mlx"         # mlx (in-process via mlx-lm) | ollama
model = ""             # blank = engine default
mode = "casual"        # casual | strict

[hotkey]
key = "fn"             # fn (the 🌐 key, bottom-left) | cmd_r | cmd_l | alt_r | alt_l | ctrl_r | ctrl_l

[behavior]
pause_music = false
save_history = true
keep_last_audio = true # run/last-recording.wav; `v2t transcribe ~/.v2t/run/last-recording.wav` redoes a cut dictation

Cleanup engine

Cleanup runs in-process via mlx-lm by default (Qwen3.5-2B-4bit, non-thinking) — no daemon, no HTTP, same MLX stack as transcription.

Measured over 208 real dictations in casual mode (M4 Pro; the ordering holds on slower chips):

Pick another with [cleanup] model = "mlx-community/…"; it downloads on the next launch.

Already running Ollama? Switch to it (v2t setup offers this when it detects Ollama, or edit the config):

[cleanup]
engine = "ollama"
model = "qwen3:4b-instruct-2507"   # then: ollama pull qwen3:4b-instruct-2507

Either way, use a non-thinking model — a model that emits <think> blocks will paste its reasoning. The defaults don't.

Optional menu-bar app

brew tap lucharo/voice2text https://github.com/lucharo/voice2text.git
brew install --cask voice2text   # prebuilt, notarised: /Applications/Voice2Text.app
v2t menubar install              # or compile it here into ~/Applications/Voice2Text.app

The optional app is a single, inspectable Swift source file — no window, Xcode project, AppleScript, or separate settings system. It exists because macOS only grants microphone access to a real app identity. The menu requests the two native grants, starts one long-running Python process, shows state immediately (the icon turns red while recording), previews the last transcription with a copy action, and links to config, history, and log. Run v2t in a terminal instead if you do not want the menu.

Start v2t loads Parakeet and the cleanup model once, then keeps them warm for every transcription. To start the same menu app at login, install the optional per-user LaunchAgent:

v2t service install       # install + start ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.lucharo.voice2text.plist
v2t service status
v2t service uninstall

The service starts the same Voice2Text.app bundle, so manual and login launches share one stable permission identity. The engine lock still prevents duplicate Python processes.

Both routes produce the same bundle, signed with hardened runtime plus the audio-input entitlement. The cask ships a build signed with a Developer ID Application certificate and notarised by Apple, which is what a Mac with no signing identity of its own needs; it carries no user paths and finds ~/.v2t and the uv tool install voice2text interpreter at launch, and its menu says "v2t is not installed" with the one command to run when it cannot. v2t menubar install compiles the same source on this Mac with the best identity in the keychain (Developer ID, then Apple Development, then ad-hoc). When both copies exist, v2t menubar open and the login service prefer the one in /Applications. Releasing the cask is just release-macos --publish on a Mac with the Developer ID certificates (see scripts/release-macos.sh).

Permissions. v2t needs Microphone (record) and Accessibility (global hotkey + paste). A terminal launch uses your terminal's grants. The menu app requests its own grants and shows their live state as flat rows; click a missing row to open the exact Settings pane.

Models & benchmarks

The contributor-only just bench harness writes ~/.v2t/benchmarks/results/<date>-<host>.md — two tables (speech-to-text RTF and cleanup TTFT/total), one column per model. It lives in the dev group, not the installed CLI. See benchmarks/ for the method and defaults.

This is macOS / Apple Silicon-only by design (MLX, native pasteboard/event APIs, nowplaying-cli, System Settings permission URLs). Fork it for Linux/Windows if you like.

Contributor questions, including how releases are published, are covered in the FAQ.