Is Dragon NaturallySpeaking discontinued?

The short answer is that the Windows software has not been discontinued as far as we can find, but its name has changed. The Dragon NaturallySpeaking name is the old one, and the Windows product is now sold as Dragon Professional. The Mac version and the consumer editions have been discontinued. The rest of this page separates the editions, because the answer depends on which one you mean. Our Dragon guide covers the full history.

The name changed, but Dragon Professional 16 is still the Windows product

Dragon NaturallySpeaking's Windows line now goes by the name Dragon Professional ¹. Its current desktop release is version 16, which became the stable release in February 2023 ². That date comes from an encyclopedia infobox, not from a Nuance notice, so treat it as a secondary source.

Nuance's Windows product page for Dragon Professional v16 described the product when we checked it on October 16, 2026. It offered a Contact us link in place of a price ¹. That shows the product was still marketed on that day. It does not show that any particular store has stock, so confirm with a reseller before you buy.

We found no notice giving an end-of-life date for the desktop Dragon Professional 16. Nuance's life cycle table covers the cloud Anywhere releases, which is discussed below.

The Mac version ended in 2018

Nuance stopped providing updates for Dragon Professional Individual for Mac after 22 October 2018 ³. No newer Mac version has followed. If you still run an old copy, expect no updates, and read our page on Dragon for Mac for what that means in practice. For dictation on a current Mac, offline dictation on Mac covers the built-in options.

The consumer editions are off sale

Dragon Premium 13 was withdrawn from the market effective 1 September 2018 ⁴. A reseller notice says Dragon Home is no longer for sale ⁵. That notice gives no date, and we did not find a Nuance notice that does, so this page gives none. Treat any old Home or Premium box as an edition you cannot buy new.

Cloud Anywhere releases each have their own end dates

Dragon Professional Anywhere is the cloud-hosted edition. It is a different product from the Windows desktop line. Nuance's support policy says a cloud release more than 24 months old will no longer work ⁶. Its life cycle table gives August 31, 2026 as the end-of-life date for Dragon Professional Anywhere 2021.1 ⁷. The same date appears for several other older releases, so that date has already passed for them.

Some resellers have published end dates for Anywhere, and a competing vendor says those dates come from Nuance partners rather than a Nuance notice ⁸. We could not confirm those dates from a Nuance source, so this page does not repeat them.

It depends on which edition you use

What to do if your version is ending

1. Read the name and version on your invoice or in the program. "Anywhere", "Home" and "Mac" each mean a different situation.
2. Get the end-of-life date in writing from your reseller or from Nuance for that exact version. This is the step public sources cannot settle for you.
3. Keep your custom words and commands before you change versions. Nuance says automatic upgrades keep them ⁹, but a copy costs nothing and your vocabulary is the slowest part to rebuild.
4. Compare your options if the version you use is ending. The alternatives to Dragon guide lists what each one does, and is Dragon worth it sets out the cost test.

If you are deciding between editions and wonder whether the product still does AI-style recognition, read does Dragon NaturallySpeaking use AI. For the name confusion, read Dragon Dictate vs Dragon NaturallySpeaking. The dictation software overview covers the wider choice.