Offline voice to text on Mac — no internet required

Updated June 2026 · macOS 13+

Vlow does offline voice-to-text on Mac: speech recognition runs entirely on-device (FireRedASR), so it works in airplane mode, on a flight, or on a closed corporate network — and your audio is never uploaded. Speak, and clean text lands at your cursor with no internet connection at all.

Vlow vs cloud dictation (internet needed?)

Comparison based on publicly available information as of June 2026; features may change.

How offline recognition works

Instead of streaming your microphone to a server, Vlow loads a speech-recognition model onto your Mac and runs it locally. The model turns audio into text on the device itself, so there's nothing to upload and nothing to wait on a network for. Optional AI polish of the resulting text is off by default and can also run fully locally via Ollama.

When offline matters

• Flights and travel — dictate notes, drafts and tasks with no Wi-Fi.
• Secure / regulated environments — closed networks where uploading audio isn't allowed.
• Privacy — your voice simply never leaves the machine.
• Reliability — no latency or outages from a remote service.

More than a transcript

Offline, Vlow still turns speech into structured text (prompt / commit / task / doc) and can capture voice notes that auto-compile into weekly reports exported to Word — all on-device.

FAQ