Open with Menu bar → Dictation Settings… or Settings → Dictation → Dictation Settings….
General
Setting | What it does |
Hotkeys | Your dictation bindings and their gestures. fn hold and fn+space are active today. |
Launch at login | Start dictation with your Mac |
Sound cues | A subtle sound when listening starts and when text is inserted |
Pause hotkey | Temporarily let fn pass through. For gaming or screen sharing |
Quick task capture | Enables right ⌥ to speak an action item |
Learn corrections automatically | When you fix a word right after dictating, add it to your dictionary immediately (with an Undo). Off: corrections wait in Amlin's review queue. |
Pill position | Where the dictation pill appears on screen |
Hold-to-start delay | How long you must hold before capture begins |
Transcription
Setting | What it does |
Engine | The on-device speech engine. Everything runs on this Mac. |
Model | Download status, progress, and a delete option (~450 MB) |
Unload model after N min idle | Frees memory when you're not dictating; reloads automatically on the next dictation |
Keep microphone engine warm Ns | Keeps the mic engine ready briefly after a session so your first word is never clipped |
Style
Setting | What it does |
Default cleanup level | Verbatim / Light / Standard |
Spoken dates | How "July twenty-fourth" is written: 7/24, July 24, or 24/7. The year is added only if you say it. Doesn't apply at Verbatim. |
Use the on-device cleanup model | Downloads and enables the optional deeper cleanup that Standard uses for rambling speech. Runs entirely on this Mac. |
Writing style | Set per app in the App profiles tab |
See also: Snippets, Per-app behavior, Custom Dictionary, Dictation History, and the Health tab, which shows live permission status with fix-it buttons. Check Health first if dictation stops working after a macOS update.