Yap for writers
Draft your book by voice, in the app you already write in.
Talk through a scene and Yap types it at your cursor, with punctuation, in Word, Google Docs or any writing app. Your speech is recognized on your own Mac or PC, so an unpublished manuscript never leaves it.
Mac, Windows, iPhone and Android. $6.90 USD a month or $69 USD a year. 3 days free with a free account, no card, then a 10-day trial with a card.
What changes
Faster drafts, the same edit.
In a controlled study, people entered text by speech at 153 words a minute, against 52 on the keyboard. A book is not a transcription test, though: planning sets the pace, and composing with speech software has been measured at far lower speeds than talking. Writers who dictate well outline each scene first, dictate one scene per take, and keep an edit pass for names and slips.
Our guide to writing a book by dictation walks through that workflow.
Your words, not an AI’s.
Yap writes down what you said, with punctuation and capitals. It never rewrites your sentences, so the draft keeps your voice.
The manuscript stays yours.
Recognition runs on your computer. The audio is not uploaded, and nothing you dictate trains a model.
Write anywhere.
After setup it dictates without a connection (it checks your access once a day), and the same subscription covers your phone for notes on the go.
Being fair
What it does not do.
- Long takes are split. Each recording runs up to 5 minutes, so a long chapter is several takes.
- No custom dictionary. Invented names and places may come out spelled several ways; fix them in the edit pass, or with your writing app’s find and replace.
- No voice editing. You cannot say “delete that” or “select the last sentence”; edit with the keyboard.
Questions.
- Can I dictate a whole chapter with Yap?
- Yes, in takes. Each recording runs up to 5 minutes; press Space while holding the key to keep talking hands-free, then finish and carry on with the next take. The text of each take is typed where your cursor is.
- Does it work in my writing app?
- Yap types into whatever app your cursor is in: Word, Google Docs, Pages, a notes app or your editor. Hold Fn on a Mac or Ctrl + Win on Windows, speak, and let go.
- Will it change my words?
- No. Yap writes down what you said with punctuation and capital letters; in English it also drops "um" and "uh". It does not rewrite your sentences with AI, so the draft stays in your voice.
- Is my unpublished manuscript safe?
- Speech is recognized on your own computer and the audio is never uploaded. Nothing you dictate is used to train a model.
Have recorded notes or interviews? Our free audio to text tool transcribes them in your browser.
From the library
Dictation for Work: Doctors, Lawyers, Writers, Students
Dictation pays off in any job that is mostly writing: in controlled tests speech is about three times faster than keyboard entry, so a draft takes a third of the time and the saving goes into editing. What differs by profession is everything around the words: who checks the draft, which vocabulary it must handle and which confidentiality rules apply. That chain is being rebuilt as AI scribes and on-device recognition replace dictating to a typist.