Dragon for Mac drives individual productivity at work by enabling fast, highly accurate dictation and transcription with the right level of customization to speed document creation. This easy-to-use solution lets you add custom words such as specific industry terminology, insert frequently-used text or shortcut repetitive tasks by voice to work faster and smarter.
From making status updates and searching the web to creating reports and spreadsheets, Dragon speech recognition software lets you do it all – faster and more efficiently – whether you're a student, a professional or an enterprise user. The Dragon menu gives you access to everything you need to use Dragon. To access the menu, click the icon in your menu bar. Select a feature in the Dragon menu to access it, or click a link below to find out more about each feature.
The fastest and most accurate way to interact with your computer
- Delivers up to 99% speech recognition accuracy right out of the box
- Get highly accurate speech recognition results with no training required
- Eliminate spelling concerns and minimize corrections
- Enjoy superior reliability and performance with Dragon’s strong technology foundation
- Provides a personalized voice-driven experience
- Achieve increasingly accurate results the more you use it
- Enjoy personalized accuracy; Dragon learns the words and phrases you use the most and spells even difficult words and proper names correctly
- Further enhance accuracy with optional advanced training or analysis of existing documents
- Work your way using Smart Format Rules; dictate naturally and the text appears as you intended it to
- Work effortlessly with a solution that just “gets” you and how you speak
- Performs with fast response times and minimal latency
- Talk at normal speeds and see words appear on the screen almost instantly
- Receive immediate feedback on what you say so you can check it right away
Never lose a beat in your train of thought; Dragon captures your ideas as fast as you can speak them.
Use your voice to dictate documents or enter text anywhere you normally type
Dragon eliminates barriers to productivity and creativity by letting you interact with your computer by voice. It turns your spoken thoughts into text and your voice commands into action so you don’t have to worry about the mechanics of typing and spelling.
Dragon eliminates barriers to productivity and creativity by letting you interact with your computer by voice. It turns your spoken thoughts into text and your voice commands into action so you don’t have to worry about the mechanics of typing and spelling.
- Think out loud
- Overcome writer’s block
- Express yourself more creatively
- Avoid spelling errors
- Capture ideas up to three times faster than typing
- Multitask thanks to hands-free interaction
- Enter text quickly in forms, chats, social media, blogs and more
Edit and format documents — all by voice
Dragon not only lets you dictate up to three times faster than typing, but it also allows you to make edits and apply formatting using your voice. You can select text and apply formatting such as bold, underline, capitals and more, or just speak to make needed changes. Smart Format Rules automatically adapt to how you want abbreviations, numbers and more to appear, so you don’t have to correct them every time.
Dragon not only lets you dictate up to three times faster than typing, but it also allows you to make edits and apply formatting using your voice. You can select text and apply formatting such as bold, underline, capitals and more, or just speak to make needed changes. Smart Format Rules automatically adapt to how you want abbreviations, numbers and more to appear, so you don’t have to correct them every time.
- Make edits and format text quickly—faster than using your mouse and keyboard
- Automatically format text to appear the way you want it to—every time
Easily switch between keyboard, mouse and voice so you can use the mode of input you prefer for any given task.
Automate business processes with time-saving workflows
Create AppleScripts, Automator Workflows, or shell scripts and let Dragon for Mac activate them by voice to automate simple workflows or multi-step business processes via simple voice commands.
Create AppleScripts, Automator Workflows, or shell scripts and let Dragon for Mac activate them by voice to automate simple workflows or multi-step business processes via simple voice commands.
Command and control your computer by voice
Launch applications, select menu items, press keys, switch between windows, search the Web, create and send emails and more all by voice, if you wish. Dragon for Mac gives you the flexibility to:
Launch applications, select menu items, press keys, switch between windows, search the Web, create and send emails and more all by voice, if you wish. Dragon for Mac gives you the flexibility to:
- Work hands-free, if desired
- Experience more ergonomic comfort when working on your computerreatively
- Feel less stress and strain on your body
- Multitask by using your voice to dictate and execute commands
Choose your microphone option for freedom and flexibility
With automatic microphone detection, Dragon will conveniently show you which microphones are available for you to use. With Dragon for Mac you can also use multiple audio device types within the same profile, enabling you to easily switch to another microphone while keeping all your personalized preferences for accuracy and formatting. This is useful if, for example, you use a USB mic at home, a wireless mic at work and your Mac’s built-in mic when you’re on the go. You have the option to use:
With automatic microphone detection, Dragon will conveniently show you which microphones are available for you to use. With Dragon for Mac you can also use multiple audio device types within the same profile, enabling you to easily switch to another microphone while keeping all your personalized preferences for accuracy and formatting. This is useful if, for example, you use a USB mic at home, a wireless mic at work and your Mac’s built-in mic when you’re on the go. You have the option to use:
- Microphones built into all MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and iMac computers: You’re free to dictate documents and speak commands directly into your Mac without using a headset for optimal flexibility and convenience
- Wireless Bluetooth mic: Use a Nuance-certified Bluetooth headset microphone for outstanding wireless performance and the freedom to move while working on your computer
- Any other Nuance-approved microphone: See support.nuance.com/compatibility for more information.
Easy to get started, easy to master
Dragon Professional Individual makes it easy to get started with speech recognition and to become proficient quickly with regular use. It’s also simple to explore more advanced features that can boost your productivity even further.
Dragon Professional Individual makes it easy to get started with speech recognition and to become proficient quickly with regular use. It’s also simple to explore more advanced features that can boost your productivity even further.
- Fast, easy set-up gets you going with speech recognition in no time
- Helpful tutorials make it easy to become productive right away
- An intuitive design provides easy access to a rich and powerful feature set for ever-increasing productivity gains
Additional help with in-context guidance at any time, giving you not only a hint on the spot but allowing you to learn these essential commands over time.
Sync with separate Dragon Anywhere mobile app
Dragon Anywhere is a separate, cloud-based app that provides continuous dictation capabilities, letting you create and edit documents of any length by voice—using your own customized words, shortcuts and commands—directly on your iOS or Android device. It adapts to your voice and terminology so you can dictate, edit, navigate and format quickly and accurately within your document from anywhere. Your documents, preferences and customizations can be synced with Dragon desktop offerings for seamless productivity wherever your job takes you. Gain immediate access to your dictation without having to wait or rely on a costly transcription service so can spend more time contributing to your bottom line and less time behind a desk completing administrative tasks.
Dragon Anywhere is a separate, cloud-based app that provides continuous dictation capabilities, letting you create and edit documents of any length by voice—using your own customized words, shortcuts and commands—directly on your iOS or Android device. It adapts to your voice and terminology so you can dictate, edit, navigate and format quickly and accurately within your document from anywhere. Your documents, preferences and customizations can be synced with Dragon desktop offerings for seamless productivity wherever your job takes you. Gain immediate access to your dictation without having to wait or rely on a costly transcription service so can spend more time contributing to your bottom line and less time behind a desk completing administrative tasks.
Enjoy a more intuitive user experience
Dragon for Mac appears in the OS X menu bar, making all features easily accessible from a single menu. You can now change profiles right from the menu as well as instantly access preferences and tools to improve recognition. Dragon for Mac features a newly redesigned Status Window, looking more modern and at home on OS X Yosemite, incorporates a new guidance feature which displays the most common next steps relative to the actions you’re taking at that moment, making it even easier to use.
Dragon for Mac appears in the OS X menu bar, making all features easily accessible from a single menu. You can now change profiles right from the menu as well as instantly access preferences and tools to improve recognition. Dragon for Mac features a newly redesigned Status Window, looking more modern and at home on OS X Yosemite, incorporates a new guidance feature which displays the most common next steps relative to the actions you’re taking at that moment, making it even easier to use.
Menu walking
Select items in any menu by voice. Menu walking lets you say “click File Menu” and the File menu opens, or say “click New File” and it works just like clicking a mouse.
Select items in any menu by voice. Menu walking lets you say “click File Menu” and the File menu opens, or say “click New File” and it works just like clicking a mouse.
Improved support for internal microphones for freedom and flexibility
Now you have enhanced accuracy in using microphones built into all MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and iMac computers. You’re free to dictate documents and speak commands directly into your Mac without using a headset for optimal flexibility and convenience.
Now you have enhanced accuracy in using microphones built into all MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and iMac computers. You’re free to dictate documents and speak commands directly into your Mac without using a headset for optimal flexibility and convenience.
Get enhanced support for more accents
Dragon for Mac offers improved recognition of Canadian, SE Asian, Indian, and Australian English accents.
Dragon for Mac offers improved recognition of Canadian, SE Asian, Indian, and Australian English accents.
Gain powerful voice control in Word 2016
Dragon for Mac provides support for Word 2016 with Full Text Control and built-in commands lets you effortlessly mix talking and typing.
Dragon for Mac provides support for Word 2016 with Full Text Control and built-in commands lets you effortlessly mix talking and typing.
Save transcribed files as Microsoft Word documents
Transcription results can now be saved as .RTF or Microsoft Word format and opened in your application of choice. Previously, transcription results appeared in the Notepad, meaning you had to copy and paste them into your favorite application.
Transcription results can now be saved as .RTF or Microsoft Word format and opened in your application of choice. Previously, transcription results appeared in the Notepad, meaning you had to copy and paste them into your favorite application.
- CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4 Ghz or faster processor - Intel Core i3, i5 or i7 recommended
- Free hard disk space: 4GB
- Supported Operating Systems: OS X Mavericks (10.9) or OS X Yosemite (10.10)
- RAM: 4GB, 8GB+ recommended
- A DVD-ROM drive
- An Internet connection for installation and automatic product activation (a quick anonymous process)
- Built-in microphone or a Nuance-approved microphone. See support.nuance.com/compatibility for more information
- CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4 Ghz or faster processor - Intel Core i3, i5 or i7 recommended
- Free hard disk space: 8GB
- Supported Operating Systems: OS X Mavericks (10.9) or OS X Yosemite (10.10)
- RAM: 4GB, 8GB+ recommended
- An Internet connection for installation and automatic product activation (a quick anonymous process)
- Built-in microphone or a Nuance-approved microphone. See support.nuance.com/compatibility for more information
Looking for a review of Version 6? Click here!
Today Dragon Dictate Version 5 (renamed “Dragon for Mac”) was released. It’s a major upgrade from Nuance who are the creators of Dragon Naturally Speaking. They have flagged the importance of this release with the name change from ‘Dragon Dictate’ to simply ‘Dragon for Mac’. It looks different and it feels different, my overall my initial response is… it’s the best and worst version of Dragon so far. Worst because it crashes a lot. The best because of the design and accuracy.
SUMMARY:
The Good: Incredibly accurate. Fast. Looks great. Does not require significant time to be trained.
The Bad: Slow to Load. Problems with capitalisation and spacing.
The Ugly: Crashes a lot. Unstable. Does not work with Microsoft Office 2016.
UPDATE: This review was done in September 2015 and my conclusion was to ‘wait for the first bug fix release to get a more stable product.‘ It’s now four months later. We are up to Dragon version 5.0.4, and based on my own experience and the comments of people below, it’s not getting any better. In fact it’s now become so unstable under ‘El Capitan’ that I’ve had to stop using it. I have gone back to using the built-in dictation, which is pretty painful, but at least it doesn’t crash!
Integration
The most obvious difference is that the Dragon Dictate Application seems to have completely disappeared as an app and it has more or less integrated itself into the operating system. This is fantastic. It doesn’t feel like Dragon is now a clunky add on application – it feels like part of OS X itself.
If you have the status window hidden, the only way you know Dragon for Mac is running is that it appears in a small menu icon at the top right of your screen. You can access the Dragon menu commands from whatever app you happen to be in. It feels more integrated into other applications than the previous version of Dragon. You can be dictating into Apple Pages and access the Dragon menu to do ‘vocabulary training’ or ‘microphone setup’ without switching apps.
The new Dragon menu is available from any application you are in.
There is no longer a separate ‘note pad’ application to dictate into, rather Nuance have designed Dragon to dictate into any app. Now they haven’t fully pulled this off yet – see the comments below under ‘integration into applications’ – but this is certainly a step in the right direction.
Aesthetics
Dragon for Mac looks a lot prettier. If you say ’show status window’ (or select it from the Dragon menu) the new status window appears. It’s is a huge improvement on the old one. Instead of being that ugly black colour from the 1980s, the status window has been redesigned with the OSX and iOS 8 look and feel.
For example here are some pictures of the status window.
As well as giving you a volume level it displays tips of what you can say. These tips are really useful, especially for new users to Dragon, although I’ve been using it for years and I still found them useful. The suggestions vary depending on the context – where your cursor is.
The status window with some text selected.
Accuracy
The speech recognition accuracy seems fairly similar to what it was in Dragon 4 (I was running Dragon 4 with the ‘accuracy’ set to maximum.) Dragon claim an accuracy improvement of 15%. That might be true but it’s hard to notice. I imported my old speech profile across to Dragon for Mac and the amount of mistakes that are being made doesn’t seem to have changed significantly. I’m not coming away thinking ‘wow, this is a huge improvement in the speech recognition accuracy.’ I am coming away with a big wow in terms of the ability to dictate without any training – more about that later.
Speed
The lack of noticeable improvement in accuracy is more than made up for in the speed improvement. The speed at which the speed recognition is done is incredible! The text appears almost instantaneously the moment you stop speaking. In Dragon Dictate version 4 there was a noticeable lag between the end of your sentence and when the text was pasted into the application.
In version 4 there was also a setting for you to choose between ‘accuracy’ and ‘ speed.’ There was a trade-off between the two. Running at the ‘accurate’ end of the spectrum, I found Dragon Dictate slightly too slow, whereas running at the ‘speed’ end of the spectrum I found that Dragon Dictate made too many mistakes. That setting has disappeared and the new Dragon for Mac seems to be running at full speed and full accuracy. So overall there is a noticeable improvement in performance.
Training
For the first time ever, you can now use Dragon without any training at all! In every previous version of Dragon Dictate you had to spend 5 to 10 minutes in front of the computer reading to it so that it could learn to adapt to your voice. This might not be an unreasonable investment given the time that you will save in using Dragon, but it is a bit of a downer when you first receive the software to have to sit through all the training. Remarkably, Dragon for Mac recognises your speech very accurately with no training at all. I dictated the second half of this article right in an untrained profile of Dragon for Mac and it was very usable straight out of the box with no voice training!
There is an option for extra ‘Voice Training’ if you want to improve the accuracy.
Sadly there are way too many issues with Dragon for Mac. It’s almost like a beta testing version. If buggy software annoys you it’s probably worth waiting for the next minor upgrade date before you upgrade.
Slowness to Load
Once Dragon for Mac is running, the speech recognition is fast, but the application itself is terribly slow to install and to load. When Dragon for Mac is launched there is a message “Dragon is Starting up…’ and Dragon for Mac takes about 30 seconds to load. Most of my other apps take 1-2 seconds to launch. My MacMini takes 15 seconds for the entire boot process. So it takes twice as long to load Dragon as it does to boot my entire OS X.
During installation there were lots of spinning beach balls with no indication as to whether my computer had crashed or was still doing something.
Crashing during Training
The first problem I encountered, and I have to admit it was a pretty major one, is that when I did have a go at ‘voice training’ (I couldn’t help myself) Dragon for Mac crashed about 5 minutes into the process, losing all of the training I had done. Even when it goes smoothly, training is a pain in the neck – sitting at your computer reading monotonous passages – it’s worse when it crashes! I didn’t bother retraining to see if the accuracy improved.
Dragon Mage Academy
The training passages are exactly the same ones that Nuance used in previous versions of Dragon so it’s not real exciting reading. (Yes it’s the same readings about the difference between ‘ice cream’ and ‘I scream.’ aaaarrrrgh)
Integration into Applications
Dragon for Mac is designed to dictate into any application, so that you do not need a separate app like ‘Notepad’.
You cannot mix typing and speaking in any app – Dragon gets confused. But Nuance claim that Dragon has been designed to work especially well Microsoft Word and Text Edit. I don’t have Microsoft Word, I use Apple’s pages. It seems a strange choice that Dragon would choose to integrate with Microsoft Word, but not with Apple Pages. Full integration with Apple Mail would have been nice too.
So what does this full integration mean? With Microsoft Word and Text Edit you can ‘mix’ dictation and typing. You can type some text, and then you can say ‘select word‘ and Dragon will go back and selected the word that you typed. Or you can say ‘ insert before word‘ and Dragon for Mac will go back and start dictating from before that word ( even if you typed that word rather than dictated it). This feature is only available from within Word and Text Edit. You can’t do that in Apple pages or Apple mail. In any other app other than Word and Text Edit, you can only use ‘select word‘ with words that you have dictated.
Dragon not work with the latest Office 2016. I think this is a problem with Microsoft Word rather than Dictate because the OS-X dictate does not work in the new Microsoft Word either.
Problems with capitalisation and dropping the last letter of a word.
These problems carry over from Version 4. Using Text Edit (the only piece of software that I have that you can mix your ‘speaking’ and ‘typing’ with) Dragon seems to still have some problems capitalising the first word in a sentence when you are mixing speaking and typing. For example when I typed a full stop (period) at the end of a line, and then said ‘new line’ and started dictating, Dragon began the next sentence with a lowercase letter instead of an uppercase one. There are also times when I found myself clicking in the middle of a sentence to add a word and dictate would capitalise that, even though it was in the middle of a sentence. There are a few times I have just clicked at the end of a sentence and started dictating and Dragon doesn’t capitalise the first letter of the sentence there either. So it seems to have trouble working out the context of a single word within a sentence in terms of whether to capitalise it or not.
Dragon Dictation For Mac
Apple dictation on my iPhone doesn’t seem to have any problem getting this right. It looks back at how the last word ended and works out whether it should be beginning with a capital letter or not.
This might sound like I am being picky but by version 5 Nuance should have something as simple as capitalisation working.
In Dragon Dictate version 4 there was the dreaded dropping the last letter of the word bug, where you would click after a word, start dictating, and Dragon Dictate would remove the last letter of the previous word, drop in your dictated text, and then stick the orphaned letter at the end of the sentence. This has happened to me a number of times with Dragon for Mac, so there are still a few issues to iron out.
Finally, Dragon for Mac seems to add a space before every word that you dictate. Sometimes this is desirable, but not all the time, the problem is that Dragon for Mac always adds a space. So if you click into a sentence and you click straight before a word (after a space), and start dictating, you get a double space before the word, and then no space after the word. This was also the case with Dragon Dictate. I think this is what Nuance mean when they say that ‘dictating’ mixed with ‘typing’ doesn’t work in applications other than Microsoft Word and Text Edit. It will be nice when this happens in all applications.
Other Issues
There are lots of little bugs. Some advanced features are not working. I can’t edit Applescripts. I can’t add keyboard shortcuts. I can’t add Menu Commands. If you look on the forums there are a few other teething issues. It seems this is a fairly major overhaul that is more than skin deep and this has led to some problems that were not there in previous versions. I assume these will be sorted out fairly soon.
This is the most significant upgrade to Dragon since Dragon Dictate was released.
In this previous review of version 4 I said that I did not think it was worth the upgrade from 3 to 4. I thought it was rude of Nuance to charge such a hefty upgrade fee ($149) to it’s loyal users for such a lame offering.
Well for those of you who decided to wait, todays upgrade to ‘Dragon for Mac’ is the upgrade you were waiting for.
Dragon for Mac has been given a facelift as well as a good boost under the hood.
Upgrading to Dragon for Mac is a no brainer – conceptually it’s the best Dragon we’ve had. If you are desperate I would go for version 5.0 and start enjoying the new features now, but it might be better to wait for the first bug fix release to get a more stable product.
Purchasing
You can buy it direct from Nuance from here (affiliate link).
If you buy it direct from Nuance you get the 30 day money back guarantee.
But if you are going to buy it read here for the interesting price differences. On Nuances own store the price (for the upgrade) varies from $99 to $150.