Ranking 2026 · As of October 9, 2026

Top 5 Superwhisper alternatives

Superwhisper is one of the most popular dictation apps on the Mac: it has local and cloud models, AI modes, call recording and one licence for the Mac, Windows, iPhone and Android. Still, many people look for alternatives. The free plan is dictation on local Whisper and two modes without AI: AI modes, call recording, your own API keys and file transcription all need Pro at $84.99 a year. Polish is named for one model only, and there is no way to ask questions across all your meetings in the app.

We put together the apps that really compete with Superwhisper for dictation on the Mac and meeting notes. We compared them only on their public pages and pricing (as of October 9, 2026): where your data goes, working offline and without an account, price, free plan, your own API keys, meetings, notes and languages. Here is the result.

Five apps to use instead of Superwhisper, in order.

  1. 1. Captylo

    Our product

    Captylo is a Mac app that puts privacy first. Speech recognition runs on your Mac, offline too, and your history with recordings, your meetings and your notes stay in a local database on your disk. In the Free plan nothing leaves your computer until you turn on the cloud yourself. There is no telemetry, and you do not even need an account.

    One app gives you dictation into any program, meeting notes without a bot and voice notes, Polish first, with English and 23 other European languages. Free has no word limit; with your own API key it also gives you the cloud and AI modes for dictation and AI in notes. Pro costs $84 a year (about $7 a month) or $9 a month and adds the cloud with no keys plus the meeting AI: notes with decisions and tasks, questions across all meetings and citations that play the recording. The Pro server streams the data and stores none of the content. The app is open source (GPLv3).

    Key features

    • Speech recognition on your Mac, works offline
    • A local database: history, recordings, meetings and notes on your disk
    • No account and no telemetry in the Free plan
    • Dictation into any Mac app with one hotkey
    • AI modes: cleanup, email, to-do list, English and your own
    • Meeting recording without a bot, a live transcript on your Mac
    • AI meeting notes and questions across all meetings (Pro)
    • Voice notes: a hotkey, dictating into a note, audio import
    • Search across meetings and notes
    • A local MCP server for your AI assistant
    Pricing:
    Free with no word limit and no account, forever. Pro $84 a year or $9 a month, 7 days of Pro free for a new account, no card.
    Best for:
    people who care about privacy: they write a lot, have meetings and want their recordings and notes to stay on their Mac.

    Why it is number 1 here

    • It recognises speech on your Mac by default, and the cloud works only if you turn it on.
    • Your history with recordings, your meetings and your notes sit in a local database on your disk. In Free nothing leaves your Mac, there is no telemetry, and the Pro server stores none of the content.
    • Free needs no account and includes meeting recording without a bot, with a live transcript. Superwhisper puts call audio recording in Pro.
    • Your own API key in Free: the cloud and AI modes for dictation, and AI in notes. Superwhisper puts your own keys in Pro.
    • The meeting AI in Pro: notes with decisions and tasks, questions across one or all meetings with sources, and [mm:ss] citations that play the recording.
    • Polish is its first language, with English and 23 other European languages next to it.
    • Voice notes with AI, and the app is open source (GPLv3).
  2. 2. Superwhisper

    Pro: $84.99 a year or $249.99 once

    Superwhisper is a dictation app by SuperUltra, a company based in Toronto, Canada. It runs on the Mac, Windows, iOS and Android, and recognises speech locally or in the cloud, depending on the mode you pick. The free plan gives you unlimited dictation on local Whisper models, up to two modes without AI, a vocabulary and text replacements.

    Pro costs $8.49 a month, $84.99 a year or $249.99 once and covers all your devices. AI modes, screen context, call audio recording, speaker labels, file transcription and your own API keys for text models all need Pro. On the Mac it has a CLI with a local MCP server, and the maker says it does not train models on user data.

    Key features

    • Dictation into any app, locally or in the cloud
    • AI modes and your own modes with a choice of model (Pro)
    • Super Mode with the app and selected-text context (Pro)
    • Meeting recording without a bot and speaker labels (Pro)
    • Audio and video file transcription (Pro)
    • A CLI and a local MCP server on the Mac

    Strengths

    • Free, unlimited and offline dictation on Whisper models
    • One licence for the Mac, Windows, iPhone and Android, lifetime too
    • The maker says it does not train models on user data

    Limits

    • AI modes, call recording and your own keys need Pro
    • Offline AI only with the S1-mini model, which is English only
    • Speaker labels are not included in AI summaries
    • The iPhone app is English only
    Pricing:
    Free with local Whisper; Pro $8.49 a month, $84.99 a year or $249.99 once; 40% off for students.
    Best for:
    people who want a wide choice of models, also work on Windows or a phone, or prefer to pay once.

    When to stay with Superwhisper

    • You dictate on Windows, iPhone or Android, on an Intel Mac or on macOS 14.0-14.3.
    • You prefer to pay once: Superwhisper has a $249.99 lifetime licence, Captylo has none.
    • You want a wide choice of text and voice models, or your company needs Enterprise with SOC 2 Type II, central sign-in and model access control.
    • You mostly dictate to coding agents (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor), or you want the AI to use the app, the selected text and the clipboard as context (Super Mode).

    Website: superwhisper.com · facts from the public offer, as of October 9, 2026

  3. 3. Wispr Flow

    Pro: $144 a year or $15 a month

    Wispr Flow is a dictation app by Wispr AI, a company based in San Francisco. It runs on the Mac, Windows, iPhone and Android: you dictate into any app, and Flow drops filler words, builds lists and matches the style to the app as you speak. Speech is always recognised in the cloud, so dictation needs an internet connection, and data is processed and stored in the US. Improving the models with user data is on by default in Free and Pro (you can turn it off).

    The free plan is 2,000 words a week on a computer and 1,000 on a phone. Pro costs $15 a month or $144 a year, and the Growth plans for teams start at $23 per seat a month. You need an account. Notetaker comes with it: it records meetings on the Mac and Windows without a bot, writes summaries and answers questions about your meetings. Meeting transcripts and summaries stay in Wispr’s cloud with no way to opt out, and the audio is deleted after 7 days.

    Key features

    • Dictation into any app on the Mac, Windows, iPhone and Android
    • Styles per app (English only) and context from the screen
    • A dictionary that learns names, and snippets
    • Command Mode and Transforms with your own prompts (beta)
    • Notetaker without a bot, with questions about meetings (Ask Wispr, beta)
    • A hosted MCP server for Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini and Cursor

    Strengths

    • One account for the Mac, Windows, iPhone and Android
    • Team features: a shared dictionary, SAML SSO, SCIM, SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001
    • Meetings linked to your calendar and Slack, import from Granola and Otter

    Limits

    • Cloud only: no dictation without internet, data goes to the US
    • Improving the models with your data is on by default in Free and Pro
    • The free plan is 2,000 words a week on a computer, an account is required
    • No own API key and no audio file transcription
    • English-level quality is claimed for 7 other languages
    Pricing:
    Free 2,000 words a week; Pro $15 a month or $144 a year; Growth $23 or $33 a month per seat; Enterprise on request.
    Best for:
    teams that dictate on Macs, Windows PCs and phones, need admin controls, SSO and Slack, and are fine with working in the cloud.

    Website: wisprflow.ai · facts from the public offer, as of October 9, 2026

  4. 4. MacWhisper

    Pro: €64 once

    MacWhisper is a Mac transcription app by Good Snooze (Jordi Bruin) from the Netherlands. It turns audio and video files and microphone recordings into text, and in Pro also meetings from Zoom, Teams or Webex, YouTube videos and whole batches of files. It has dictation into any app too. Speech is recognised on the Mac by default (models such as Whisper and Parakeet), and transcripts sit in a database on your disk; cloud transcription and AI providers only work when you add your own API key.

    The Free version is free forever. Pro costs €64 once, with lifetime updates, for your own devices (a soft limit of 3). Pro adds automatic meeting recording (beta), speaker recognition, AI with your own key or a local model, a CLI and integrations with Zapier, Make, n8n and Obsidian. On the Mac App Store and the iPhone the same app is called Whisper Transcription and has subscriptions, but no dictation and no meeting detection.

    Key features

    • Audio and video file transcription on the Mac, offline
    • Dictation into any app, with per-app AI prompts in Pro
    • Automatic meeting recording without a bot (Pro, beta)
    • Speaker recognition, batches and YouTube videos (Pro)
    • SRT and VTT subtitles, export to TXT, MD, PDF, HTML and DOCX
    • AI with your own key or locally through Ollama and LM Studio (Pro)
    • A CLI, watched folders and webhook integrations (Pro)

    Strengths

    • Transcription on the Mac by default, no account in the app
    • A licence you pay once, with lifetime updates
    • Rich file handling: batches, YouTube, subtitles, translation, an editor

    Limits

    • Meeting recording, speakers and your own API keys need Pro
    • Meeting recording is in beta; the maker warns about possible data loss
    • AI only with your own key or a local model (an AI subscription only on the App Store)
    • The App Store listing names English, Dutch, French and German as its languages
    Pricing:
    Free forever; Pro €64 once with lifetime updates; packs from 5 licences; subscriptions on the App Store, Assistant $9.99 a month or $89.99 a year.
    Best for:
    people who mostly transcribe files, recordings and interviews on the Mac and prefer to pay once.

    Website: macwhisper.com · facts from the public offer, as of October 10, 2026

  5. 5. Voibe

    Dictation: $75 a year; Work: $140 a year

    Voibe is a dictation app by Essence AI Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales. It runs on the Mac (Intel and Apple silicon, macOS 14.4+) and Windows: you dictate into any app, and Voibe adds punctuation, drops filler words and formats numbers. On an Apple silicon Mac you can choose speech recognition on the device, offline too; on Windows and Intel Macs it uses a cloud mode on zero-retention providers. Your history and Memory stay on your computer, but you need an account (an emailed sign-in code), and the app collects usage analytics and crash reports without your dictated content.

    The free plan is dictation with limited words on one device. Voibe Dictation costs $7.50 a month, $75 a year or $149 once, and Voibe Work $14 a month, $140 a year or $349 once, per seat. Work adds meeting notes without a bot: summaries in styles, a transcript with speakers and a chat with the meeting. Meeting notes are always made in the cloud, whatever mode you use for dictation; transcripts and summaries are saved on your computer, and the recording is deleted after a day.

    Key features

    • Dictation into any app on the Mac and Windows, Live Dictation on the Mac
    • On-device mode (Apple silicon) or a zero-retention cloud mode
    • Automatic formatting, optional AI formatting in the cloud
    • Memory and custom vocabulary for names, Developer Mode for code editors
    • Meeting notes without a bot in Voibe Work: summary styles and your own
    • Chat with a meeting, quoting the words, the speaker and the time

    Strengths

    • Speech recognition on an Apple silicon Mac, offline too
    • One seat covers your Mac and a Windows PC
    • A lifetime licence, up to 10 seats in one checkout and a BAA on request

    Limits

    • Meeting notes always in the cloud, the recording deleted after a day
    • An account is required, plus usage analytics and crash reports
    • The free plan has limited words on one device and no meetings
    • No own API key; the chat answers from one meeting at a time
    • Spoken punctuation commands in English only, no language picker on Windows
    Pricing:
    Free with limited words; Dictation $7.50 a month, $75 a year or $149 once; Work $14 a month, $140 a year or $349 once; per seat.
    Best for:
    people who dictate on a Mac and a Windows PC, would rather pay once for a lifetime licence and are fine with meeting notes being made in the cloud.

    Website: getvoibe.com · facts from the public offer, as of October 10, 2026

Your data stays on your Mac.

In the Free plan nothing leaves your computer until you turn on the cloud yourself. Your history with recordings, your meetings and your notes sit in a local database on your disk, the app has no telemetry, and you do not even need an account.

That is what our privacy policy says

FeatureCaptyloSuperwhisper
Speech recognised on your MacyesYes, by default; the cloud only if you turn it onyesYes: local Whisper in Free; Pro adds the cloud (the setup guide starts with the cloud)
History, meetings and notes on your diskyesYes, in a local database on your diskyesYes: history with recordings on the device, kept “Forever” by default
The maker keeps none of your contentyesYes: in Free nothing leaves your Mac, the Pro server stores none of the contentyesYes per the docs: it stores no transcripts or audio; cloud modes send data to model providers
Works offlineyesYes, by defaultyesDictation yes; offline AI only with S1-mini, in English
Works without an accountyesYes, Free needs no accountThe docs describe no sign-in; Pro is activated with a licence key (sign-in for Enterprise)

Captylo and Superwhisper in detail.

Feature by feature, from the public pages of both apps.

FeatureCaptyloSuperwhisper
Privacy and data
Speech recognised on your MacyesYes, by default; the cloud only if you turn it onyesYes: local Whisper in Free; Pro adds the cloud (the setup guide starts with the cloud)
History, meetings and notes on your diskyesYes, in a local database on your diskyesYes: history with recordings on the device, kept “Forever” by default
The maker keeps none of your contentyesYes: in Free nothing leaves your Mac, the Pro server stores none of the contentyesYes per the docs: it stores no transcripts or audio; cloud modes send data to model providers
Works offlineyesYes, by defaultyesDictation yes; offline AI only with S1-mini, in English
Works without an accountyesYes, Free needs no accountThe docs describe no sign-in; Pro is activated with a licence key (sign-in for Enterprise)
Price
Paid planPro: $84 a year or $9 a monthPro: $84.99 a year, $8.49 a month or $249.99 once
Free planyesNo word limit, foreveryesUnlimited dictation on local Whisper, up to 2 modes without AI
Dictation
Dictation into any appyesOne hotkey, text at your cursoryesMac, Windows, iPhone and Android
Your own API key in the free planyesYes: cloud and AI modes for dictation, AI in notesnoNo: your own keys for text models need Pro
AI modes and your own promptsyesCleanup, email, to-do list, English and your ownyesIn Pro: built-in modes, your own modes and Super Mode with screen context
Meetings and notes
Meeting recording without a botyesYes, with a live transcript on your Mac (Free)yesIn Pro: call audio recorded on the device, without a bot
AI meeting notesyesIn Pro: decisions and tasks, 6 templatespartlyIn Pro: Meeting Mode (attendees, action items, decisions); speaker labels are left out of summaries
Questions across all meetingsyesIn Pro: one meeting or all, with sourcesnoNot in the app per the docs; your assistant can search the history through the CLI and MCP
Citations that play the recordingyesIn Pro: [12:34] plays that momentnoNot described in the docs
Voice notesyesA hotkey, dictating into a note, audio importpartlyNote Mode and the recording history, no separate notes
Polish
Polish speech recognitionyesYes, Polish is the first languagepartlyPolish named only for the Cohere Transcribe model (Pro); Whisper: “100+ languages”
Polish interfaceyesYes (and English)Website and iPhone app in English only
Openness and platforms
Access for your AI assistant (MCP)yesA local server: meetings and notes (Free)yesA local server in the CLI (macOS only): history, vocabulary, snippets
Open source appyesYes, GPLv3noNo
PlatformsmacOS 14.4+ (Apple silicon)macOS 14+ (Apple silicon and Intel), Windows, iPhone, Android

Facts about Superwhisper come from the maker's public website, as of October 9, 2026. Their offer may change; Captylo's is always current. superwhisper.com/docs/billing/plans

Prices side by side.

Every plan from the public pricing pages, no asterisks.

Captylo

  • Free$0, foreverDictation and meetings on your Mac with no limit and no account, cloud and AI with your own key
  • Pro$84 a year or $9 a monthCloud and AI with no keys, the meeting AI, fair use: 20 h of cloud and 3 million AI tokens a month

Prices include VAT. A new account gets 7 days of Pro free, no card.

Superwhisper

  • Free$0Unlimited dictation on local Whisper, up to 2 modes without AI, vocabulary and replacements
  • Pro, co miesiąc$8.49 a monthAI modes, the cloud, call recording, speakers, file transcription, your own keys; all devices
  • Pro, rocznie$84.99 a yearThe same as Pro monthly
  • Pro Lifetime$249.99 onceThe same as Pro, paid once
  • EnterpriseOn requestSOC 2 Type II, central billing and sign-in, model access control

From the public pricing page of Superwhisper, as of October 9, 2026. superwhisper.com/docs/billing/plans

What a year costs.

The same year of work, in US dollars.

  1. Captylo Free$0 a year
  2. Captylo Pro, yearly$84 a year
  3. Superwhisper Pro, yearly$84.99 a year
  4. Superwhisper Pro, monthly$101.88 a year
  5. Superwhisper Pro Lifetime, once$249.99 a year

Prices from the public pricing pages, as of October 9, 2026.

Questions we hear most.

Short and concrete, from the public pages of both apps.

What is the best Superwhisper alternative?

If privacy and meetings matter to you, the strongest candidate is Captylo: speech recognition on your Mac, your history, meetings and notes in a local database, a free plan with no account that includes meeting recording and your own API key, and Pro for $84 a year. Also worth a look: Wispr Flow (Windows, iPhone and Android too, team features), MacWhisper (file transcription and a one-time licence) and Voibe (dictation on the Mac and Windows).

Does Captylo send my recordings to the cloud?

Not unless you turn it on. In the Free plan speech recognition, your history with recordings, meetings, notes and search all run on your Mac, and the data sits in a local database on your disk. The app has no telemetry and you need no account. When you turn on the cloud in Pro, Captylo’s server streams the data and stores none of the content.

How is Captylo different from Superwhisper?

Both dictate into any app, recognise speech locally or in the cloud and record calls without a bot. Superwhisper also runs on Windows, iPhone and Android, and puts AI modes, call recording and your own keys in Pro. Captylo runs on the Mac, records meetings and takes your own key in Free, and in Pro writes meeting notes and answers questions across all meetings with sources.

Which languages does Superwhisper handle well?

Superwhisper says it supports more than 100 languages. Its docs list languages by name for some models only, for example 14 for Cohere Transcribe (Pro), and say that with automatic detection non-English dictation sometimes comes out as English text, so they suggest setting a fixed language. The iPhone app is English only. Captylo is built Polish first, with English and 23 other European languages.

Which is cheaper: Captylo or Superwhisper?

Both have free, unlimited dictation on the Mac. Captylo Pro costs $84 a year or $9 a month, Superwhisper Pro $84.99 a year, $8.49 a month or $249.99 once. Captylo Free also includes meeting recording and your own API key, which need Pro in Superwhisper.

Can I use Captylo next to Superwhisper?

Yes. Captylo Free needs no account, so you can download it and compare on your own texts. Just set different hotkeys: Superwhisper uses Option + Space by default, Captylo the right Option key.

Where do the facts about Superwhisper come from?

From the public pages of superwhisper.com and its docs at superwhisper.com/docs (plans, models, modes, meetings, CLI, security) and its App Store listing, as of October 9, 2026. Their offer may change, so the source is linked under the table.

Your next email can be spoken.

Captylo for Mac is free, with no account and no word limit. New versions arrive in the app.

Version 1.0.17 · macOS 14.4 or newer · Apple silicon · signed and checked by Apple

Source code and earlier versions