How do you dictate in Claude?

Dictation in Claude turns your speech into the text of a prompt. You read the words, fix them, and send them, and Claude replies in text. The steps depend on where you are: the phone app, the desktop app, the Mac quick entry window, or Claude Code. Each one is below, with the requirements that Anthropic's help pages give.

On your phone, tap the microphone and then the arrow

1. Open Claude for iOS or Android and start a new chat.
2. Tap the microphone icon on the right side of the chat input field. ¹ The first time, choose your language.
3. Speak your prompt.
4. Tap the arrow icon to send the prompt. To cancel without sending, tap the X icon.

Dictation on the phone is open to every plan. Anthropic's help article says it is "available to all Claude users (Free, Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise plans)." ² Support for languages other than English is in beta ³, and our question on Claude dictation languages lists the ones available.

Anthropic's tutorial describes the phone control differently: "On your phone, you hold the mic while you talk and let go to send." ⁴ The help article's tap steps are the more specific of the two. If holding the mic does nothing in your app, use the tap steps above and check which version of the app you have.

In the desktop app, press the mic, speak, and send

Anthropic's tutorial describes the desktop app this way: "In the desktop app, you press the mic, speak, and send." ⁵ The tutorial does not say where the mic sits in the window or which version of the app it describes, so look for the microphone in the message box of your own version. The help article for dictation covers the phone apps, so the desktop steps rest on the tutorial alone.

On a Mac, Caps Lock starts dictation in quick entry

Quick entry is a small text box that opens from any app when you double-tap the Option key. The voice shortcut is off by default, because it takes over the Caps Lock key. ⁶ To turn it on:

1. Open Claude Desktop on your Mac, and double-tap the Option key to open quick entry.
2. In the voice dictation prompt, check Turn on shortcut, and then click Continue.
3. Press Caps Lock once to start dictating, and press it again when you are finished speaking ⁷. Then click the arrow to send your transcribed message.

Voice dictation in quick entry needs macOS 14 or later. ⁸ Quick entry is used to start a new chat, and the help article does not describe Caps Lock for a chat that is already open.

In Claude Code, run /voice

Claude Code is a separate product for software work, but it also has dictation. You turn it on by running /voice in the command line. ⁹ If you already use Claude Code, the guide to voice input for AI coding tools covers its keys and settings. If it does not start, read our question on why Claude Code voice is not working.

The browser version has no steps in Anthropic's help pages

Anthropic's tutorial says "Dictation is available on the web, mobile, and desktop app." ¹⁰ The help pages we read give steps for the phone apps and Mac quick entry only. For the browser, look for the microphone in the message box and test it with a short sentence. If the button is missing or silent, check the site microphone permission first, because a browser that has been blocked from the microphone records nothing.

What to do when dictation fails

Start with the simplest checks: the microphone permission for the app or browser, a short test sentence, and a stable network connection. If those do not help, our question on why Claude dictation is not working lists the causes that public reports describe, and what to try for each one.

Dictate into every app, not only Claude

The built-in controls work only inside Claude. If you want speech in email, documents and the other chat windows you use, a system-wide dictation tool types into whichever app has the cursor. Yap, which we make, is an on-device dictation app for Mac and Windows that works this way. Our guide to dictating into any app explains the approach in more detail, and the built-in tools are enough for many people.

For the ChatGPT version of this question, read how to dictate in ChatGPT. Our full guide is dictation in ChatGPT and Claude, and the apps and browsers overview links every other guide in this group.