Speech to text in Arabic, typed live into the apps you use

The short answer

DanDin turns Arabic speech into text live, while you talk, and types it into the app you are already using on a Mac or a Windows PC. Hold one key, speak, and let go. A speech engine chosen and tested for Arabic dialects hears you. Then an AI step tidies the words: it drops the "ums" and repeats, adds punctuation, writes numbers as digits, and is told to keep your dialect rather than turn it into formal Arabic. The default mode, "Arabic + English", takes Arabic, English or both in one go and writes each sentence in its own letters. One dictation can run for up to 30 minutes. DanDin is for live speech, not for audio files you already have. It needs the internet and has no phone app. It runs on macOS 12 or newer and on 64-bit Windows 10 and 11. The free plan is 2,000 words every rolling seven days with no card, and Pro is USD 16.99 a month.

How does Arabic speech to text work in DanDin?

Three steps, and only the middle one needs you.

1. Click where the words should go

   A chat box, an email, a document, a spreadsheet cell, a search field. DanDin writes into the app you are in, so there is no other window to open and nothing to copy afterwards.

2. Hold the start key and talk

   On a Mac, hold Fn, the key with the small globe on it. On Windows, hold Ctrl and the Windows key together. Keep holding while you speak. Settings can change the key, or let one press start and a second press stop.

3. Let go, and the text appears

   The tidied text lands at your cursor all in one piece. If something fails, DanDin types nothing, tells you in one short line, and keeps your recording so you can press Retry.

Behind those steps sit two stages. The first recognises your speech, which is where Arabic voice to text usually wins or loses. The second is an AI pass that makes the result read like writing instead of a transcript. That pass always runs. The Auto format switch in the dictation options only decides whether it also adds punctuation and numbered lists; with it off, the cleanup still happens and the punctuation is up to you. If the tidying step ever fails, you still get the plain recognised text.

Which language does it write?

Out of the box, both. The default mode, "Arabic + English", lets you speak Arabic, English or a mix, and it decides the language of each sentence by itself. Arabic sentences come out in Arabic letters and English ones in English letters. If you would rather have one script, there is "Arabic only", which spells English words in Arabic letters the way they sounded, and "English only". The full story, with the limits, is on the Arabic and English dictation page.

Do you need live dictation, file transcription, or an API?

"Speech to text arabic" covers three different jobs, and many pages that rank for it answer a different one from yours. This table is the fastest way to tell whether DanDin is the wrong shape for your problem.

The three kinds of Arabic speech to text, and which one DanDin is.

What you are doing	Live dictation	File transcription	A speech API
When you use it	You are writing something now	You already have a recording	You are building software
Where the text appears	In the app you are using	On the tool’s page, or as a download	In your own code
What you give it	Your voice, live	An audio or video file	Audio, over the network
Is DanDin this?	Yes	No	No

Swipe the table to see every column

If you have an hour of recorded Arabic audio, DanDin is the wrong tool, and we would rather say so here than waste your download. If you are writing a message, a report, a reply or a prompt right now, it is the right shape.

How long can one Arabic dictation be?

Up to 30 minutes. At 29 minutes DanDin tells you one minute is left, and at 30 it stops and types what you said. You do not wait half an hour at the end, either: during a long dictation, DanDin sends your voice to its servers in pieces at natural pauses while you are still talking, so the wait after you stop stays short. The text still lands in one go, never half a dictation.

While it works, DanDin keeps a copy of your recording in a private folder on your own computer until the text has arrived. Anything over 20 seconds is written to disk as you speak, so a crash or a power cut does not lose it, and the next launch offers Retry. Waiting recordings are deleted after 7 days and never take more than 200 MB together. What happens when the internet goes down is on the internet and offline help page.

Is Arabic speech to text free?

DanDin’s free plan is 2,000 words in any rolling seven days. Rolling means it never resets on a Monday: it is a window that keeps moving, so words you used eight days ago are yours again. There is no card, no end date, and the free plan has the same quality and speed as Pro. You get an email at 80 percent. If you run out mid-week, the pill says so, your dictation is saved, and it waits until words come back or you move to Pro.

Pro has no word limit. It costs USD 16.99 a month or USD 149 a year, and in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar it is a fixed SAR, AED or QAR 59 a month. If you have never had Pro, monthly Pro started from the app comes with 7 free days. Prices are on the pricing page.

Free Arabic speech to text also exists in tools you may already have. Google lists 15 Arabic entries for voice typing in Google Docs, in Chrome, Edge and Safari, though it only types into the document. Word’s Dictate is not free: Microsoft says "The dictation feature is only available to Microsoft 365 subscribers", and its Arabic entries are Preview languages that "may have lower accuracy or limited punctuation support". Windows voice typing lists 46 languages, and Arabic is not one. We re-read those pages on 8 October 2026.

What are DanDin’s limits today?

• Internet needed. There is no offline mode.
• Computers only. Mac and Windows. No iPhone or Android app today.
• No file transcription. Live speech only.
• 30 minutes per dictation, and 2,000 free words a week before Pro.
• Mac password fields are skipped on purpose. When an app protects your typing, like a password prompt or a terminal with Secure Keyboard Entry, DanDin copies the text and tells you to press ⌘V. Windows has no such check, so do not dictate a password on a PC.
• No vowel marks. DanDin writes Arabic without tashkeel; nothing in it adds them.
• No accuracy numbers, no dialect list. We have not published an accuracy test with real speakers, so this page has no figure.

How do you start?

Download DanDin, open it, and allow the microphone. On a Mac, also allow Accessibility, which lets DanDin type into other apps, and Input Monitoring, which lets Fn start a dictation; until then, Command + Shift + D does the job. Windows only asks for the microphone. Then click into any text box, hold the key, and say one sentence in Arabic.