💸
Free, forever
No subscriptions, no trials, no "start free then oops." Download it. It's yours.
100% free · 100% private · nothing leaves your device
Just talk.
It types for you.
Hold a key and ramble. OpenWhisper turns the mess into a sentence you'd actually send — emails, chats, notes, anywhere you can type. Completely free. Completely on your device. Your voice never leaves the building.
tap me
I'll catch the ums. You just talk.
you saytap the mic — I'll tidy the ramble →
it types
↵ pasted
$0free, forever
0data collected
100%on your device
No account. No subscription. No catch.
Why your fingers will file a complaint 😌
🔒
Completely private
Your voice and your words stay on your computer. Nothing is uploaded, stored, or shared — ever.
🧹
Polished, not messy
It quietly kidnaps the "ums" and "uhs" so the sentence that lands is actually sendable.
✍️
Works everywhere
Email, chat apps, documents, search bars — if you can type there, you can talk there.
⚡
Fast as you talk
Your words appear almost instantly, with no spinning wheels or waiting on the internet.
📡
Works offline
On a plane, on the train, or off the grid — it keeps working with no connection at all.
How it works ✨
1
Tap & talk
Hold and ramble like a human. We like humans.
→
2
It tidies up
OpenWhisper turns your speech into clean, well-written text and removes the filler words.
→
3
Done
The finished text drops right where you're typing. Send it, save it, done.
🧠 It's all powered by AI that runs right on your computer — so it's fast, works offline, and your voice never gets sent anywhere.
Make it yours ⚙️
Everything is adjustable from the Settings window — click 🤫 in your menu bar and choose Settings. Tweak something, hit Save & Reload, and you're good to go. Here are the knobs worth knowing about.
🧠
Swap the AI model (the LLM)
OpenWhisper uses a small local language model — Qwen3 4B Instruct by default — to tidy
up your words. Want a smarter or lighter one? You can point it at any
compatible model file (a .gguf file).
- Download a
.ggufmodel (for example from a model hub like Hugging Face). - Open Settings → find Local AI model.
- Click Browse and pick your
.gguffile. - Press Save & Reload. Done — it's now using your model.
💡 Tip: smaller models are faster and use less memory; larger ones write more polished text but need a beefier machine. The default Qwen3 4B Instruct is a great balance for most people.
All the settings
Global hotkey
The key you hold to talk. Defaults to Fn. Set any combo, e.g.
CmdOrCtrl+Shift+Space.Language
Hint for what you're speaking —
auto, en, es, and so on. Leave it on auto if unsure.Refine with local AI
The cleanup step. On = polished sentences. Turn it off to get the exact words you said, untouched.
Refinement prompt
The instructions the AI follows when cleaning up. Edit it to change the style — more formal, more casual, add emoji, whatever you like.
Fast paste
Drops in your raw words instantly, then swaps in the polished version a moment later. Great for low perceived lag.
Restore clipboard
Puts whatever you'd copied back on the clipboard after pasting, so dictation doesn't overwrite it.
Whisper model
The speech-to-text model. The built-in one is plenty for most people, but you can browse to a different one.
Performance
Set the max recording length and how many CPU threads to use (
0 = pick automatically).For power users: edit the config file directly
All settings live in a plain text file you can edit by hand. On macOS it's at:
~/Library/Application Support/openwhisper/config.jsonIt looks something like this — change a value, save, and restart OpenWhisper:
{
"hotkey": "Fn",
"language": "auto",
"use_llm_refinement": true,
"llm_model_path": "/path/to/your-model.gguf",
"refine_prompt": "Rewrite this as a clean message…",
"fast_paste": false
}
On Linux it's ~/.config/openwhisper/config.json; on Windows it's %APPDATA%\openwhisper\config.json.
Ready to give your fingers a vacation? 🙌
Download OpenWhisper for free. No sign-up, no credit card, no "enter your work email."
Free and open source · Built for people who'd rather their voice stay home.