What is the Voice Control shortcut on a Mac?

Apple does not document a keyboard shortcut for Voice Control on a Mac. The routes Apple lists are System Settings, under Accessibility and then Voice Control, and asking Siri to turn it on ^{1 2}. If you have seen a key combination for Voice Control online, we could not confirm it in an Apple source, so this page does not give one.

Apple's documented routes do not include a keyboard shortcut

Apple's Voice Control guide covers turning the feature on or off through System Settings. The guide's wording is "Turn Voice Control on or off", and its steps start from the Apple menu and System Settings, with no key combination in the list ( Apple's guide to turning Voice Control on or off). Apple's Siri guide also lists turning Voice Control on as a request ².

We also checked Apple's keyboard shortcuts guide for the Mac on 16 October 2026. Its body text has no entry for Voice Control. That is a check of what Apple publishes, not a claim about every setting on every version of macOS, so treat a missing shortcut as "not documented" and not as "impossible".

The Dictation shortcut is a different feature

Dictation, the standard typing-by-speech feature, has its own shortcut. On a Mac you can start it by pressing the Microphone key if the keyboard has one, by pressing the Dictation keyboard shortcut, or by choosing Edit > Start Dictation ³. If you choose Press Fn Key Twice as the Dictation shortcut, Apple says the matching Keyboard setting changes to Start Dictation (Press Fn Twice) automatically ⁴.

That shortcut starts Dictation. It does not switch Voice Control on or off. Because Voice Control replaces standard Dictation while it is on ⁵, a Dictation shortcut is not a way to start Voice Control. For the Dictation steps, see how to use Dictation on a Mac.

The closest thing to a shortcut is a spoken command

Voice Control has spoken commands for pausing and resuming. Say Stop listening to pause it, and say Start listening to resume ⁶. This is a voice command, so you say it aloud and do not press keys.

Say Show commands to see the commands that work in the app in front of you. The list changes with the app and the task ⁷. Use it to find the command you want before you guess at a phrase.

What to do if you want a fast way to switch it off

Use the settings route each time. Open System Settings, go to Accessibility, click Voice Control, and switch it off. Learn the path once and it takes a few clicks. If you want to keep the feature on but stop it reacting, say Stop listening instead of switching it off.

Do not rely on a key combination reported in a forum post unless you can test it on your own Mac and confirm that the Voice Control setting changes. A shortcut that works on one macOS version may not work on the next, and Apple's own pages are the place to check. The steps for both states are in how to turn off Voice Control on a Mac.

Related questions and guides

For the full Voice Control set-up, read our guide to Voice Control on a Mac. To tell the three voice features apart, including Siri, read Dictation vs Voice Control vs Siri on a Mac, and the Mac dictation hub lists the rest of the set. For the word itself, see our definition of dictation.