1. Install it
Download AudioPen from the App Store and sign in with your email. No credit card needed.
AudioPen for iPhone and iPad
Voice to text on iPhone, ready to send.
Your iPhone has Dictation built in: turn on Enable Dictation in Settings, then tap the microphone key. It types your words in the order you said them. The AudioPen keyboard works in any app and gives you text you'd send. Switch to it, talk, and get your exact words or a rewrite in your style. Same on iPad.
Download on the App Store
Free to start. iOS and iPadOS 17.4 or later.
Apple Dictation
Great for a quick text. Rough in a long one.
Apple Dictation is good at what it does. It runs on your iPhone in many languages without the internet, and in supported languages it adds commas and periods for you. But it types everything: the false start, the backtrack, the point you made twice. That's fine for a quick text to a friend. In a long message or an email, it reads badly.
The rewriting is the part Dictation doesn't do. On the newest iPhones, Apple Intelligence improves spelling, punctuation and capitalization in English. The AudioPen keyboard turns a ramble into clear sentences in a style you choose.
| What we compared | Apple Dictation | AudioPen |
|---|---|---|
| How you start it | Apple DictationTap the microphone key on the keyboard. | AudioPenSwitch to the AudioPen keyboard and talk. |
| Where it types | Apple DictationAnywhere you can type. | AudioPenAny app that takes keyboard input: Messages, Mail, Notes, Slack. |
| Rambling and false starts | Apple DictationTyped word for word. On iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone Air and later, Apple Intelligence improves spelling, punctuation and capitalization in English. | AudioPenAsk for a rewrite and get clear sentences back. |
| Tone and style | Apple DictationNone in Dictation itself. | AudioPenBuilt-in and custom styles, on the free plan too. |
| Without internet | Apple DictationProcessed on your iPhone in many languages, with no connection needed. | AudioPenTurn on offline transcription in AudioPen and the audio stays on your iPhone. Rewriting needs a connection. |
| Fixing what you wrote | Apple DictationSay “select” or “delete” and then the phrase. | AudioPenWith Prime, select text you've already written and rewrite it from the keyboard. |
Sources for the Apple Dictation column: Dictate text on iPhone and Dictate text on iPad, checked October 2026.
Getting started
Start talking in four steps.
2. Add the keyboard
In Settings, go to General, Keyboard, Keyboards, and tap Add New Keyboard. Pick AudioPen. iOS may ask you to allow Full Access, which some keyboard features need.
3. Switch to it
In Messages, Mail or Slack, touch and hold the globe key and pick AudioPen. You can also make it your main keyboard.
4. Talk
Say what you mean. AudioPen types it into the app, as you said it or rewritten in the style you pick.
Voice typing, in any style
Talk it through. Send it clean.
The AudioPen keyboard types, swipes and talks, so it can stay your keyboard all day. When a message needs more than a quick reply, say it however it comes out.
Talk the way you think. Start mid-thought, circle back, change your mind halfway through. AudioPen types your exact words when you want them, or writes it up in a style you pick, right at your cursor.
“hey team so the client call moved, um, it's now tomorrow at ten not two, and can someone grab the updated contract before then, I think it's in the shared drive, the v3 one, and yeah let's keep it short, half an hour max”
Quick update: the client call moved to tomorrow at 10, not 2. Could someone grab the updated contract (v3, in the shared drive) before then? Let's keep it to 30 minutes.
Works in any app, on every device: a hotkey on Mac and Windows, the AudioPen keyboard on iPhone and iPad, and a floating bubble on Android.
Privacy
Keep your audio on your iPhone.
Offline is a setting you turn on in AudioPen, and it covers the keyboard as well as the notes you record in the app. You can use cloud transcription instead. Either way, voice typing audio is never saved.
Offline when you want it
Switch on offline transcription and your iPhone does the transcribing itself, so the audio stays there.
Rewrites aren't kept
When the keyboard rewrites what you said, that step runs in the cloud. Your text is processed and thrown away, never stored.
Full Access, explained
Full Access lets the AudioPen keyboard talk to the AudioPen app and your account. You can turn it off, or remove the keyboard, in Settings at any time. iOS never uses a third-party keyboard in passcode or secure text fields.
Notes
Keep the thought for later.
Record a note in the AudioPen app, or from your Apple Watch. It's saved to your library and syncs with the web app and with AudioPen on Mac, Windows and Android.
Everywhere you work
One account on every device.
The same account works on your Mac, Windows PC and Android phone, and in the web app.
One Prime account covers all of them. Your notes sync across every device, so whatever you capture on one is waiting on the next.
Testimonials
Loved by people who think out loud
Read what real users have to say about AudioPen.
I used to manually summarize my transcribed brainstorming sessions. Took hours. AudioPen automates everything to the point where I am almost done with my article after talking about a topic for 10min. Magic.
No product has fundamentally changed the way I work over the last 12 months more than Audiopen. Home Screen on iPhone.
I can now create 95% of my blog posts and have minimal editing. In my tone of voice. This saves so much time
I’ve been using AudioPen to talk through my ideas, have them summarized and then use the summarization as a draft for blog posts. 13 out of 10. Highly recommend for the “blank page” problem.
This is probably the best product I’ve come across in the past 18 months. So useful and it just keeps getting better.
Simple, but effective. The best tool to convert rambling into structured text, while keeping what you rambled intact.
I freakin love AudioPen.ai. If you are not using it yet, get on it.
Most helpful AI tool = audiopen. Been using it daily to do things like: turn voicenotes into action items, content ideas (magic for this), summarize calls, giving feedback. The UI is also so clean that it’s an absolute joy to use.
You speak to it as thoughts come in. It stitches a fine narrative from the rant. Writers can edit a ‘wrong’ page, not a ‘blank’ page. AudioPen gets you to 90% and then you do the rest.
OH MY GOSH. I just learned about AudioPen today, and it’s already a GAME CHANGER. If you write, create, or do any serious thinking, this tool is for you.
This is one tool that has dramatically changed the way I think. It has allowed me to get the thoughts out of my head and down on paper.
I can’t say enough good things about the AudioPen app. It’s been my go-to app for getting ideas down without having to type. Not only does it arrange even the most inarticulate nonsense into readable sentences, it’s the best dictation app I’ve ever used.
I’ve been writing online for over 10 years and tried virtually every writing app, productivity, note-taking, and idea-capture system out there. Nothing comes close to the amount of time AudioPen saves me.
This is by far the greatest and most useful tool I have ever had! I have severe ADHD and it’s able to translate my rambling into a well written and concise note. I feel more organized and less anxious!
Best buy in 2023: AudioPen from @louispereira. Hats off.
Switched from Superwhisper to Audiopen Mac App within 20 minutes of using the Mac App.
Tried it out, and paid for the prime version because it is SO good and simple to use. The product has made it so much easier to track my various thoughts throughout my day.
I am a natural speaker. My ideas flow faster when I speak. I record my voice notes and with my accent, it is perfect all the time.
AudioPen is able to clear my spoken thoughts into text in Estonian, one of the most complicated languages in the world! Shut Up And Take My Money!
Already not sure what I did before I had AudioPen. If you often have thoughts you want to capture in writing, check it out. Cost is super reasonable too.
Questions
Everything you might want to know
Straight answers to the questions people ask before they start.