Justin Pot Editorial Author
Experience
Justin Pot is a freelance journalist who helps people get more out of technology.
If you’ve ever searched online for a specific tech problem you’ve read Justin’s work, because he’s been doing it for a long time. Since 2009, he has written tutorials and essays about technology for outlets including WIRED, The Atlantic, PCMag, Popular Science, [How-to Geek](https://www.howtogeek.com/author/justinpot/ “open in a new window”…
Justin Pot Editorial Author
Experience
Justin Pot is a freelance journalist who helps people get more out of technology.
If you’ve ever searched online for a specific tech problem you’ve read Justin’s work, because he’s been doing it for a long time. Since 2009, he has written tutorials and essays about technology for outlets including WIRED, The Atlantic, PCMag, Popular Science, How-to Geek, and The Wall Street Journal. For Lifehacker, he mostly writes about software, with a particular focus on open source programs and indie apps.
Justin has a bachelor’s degree in Communications and International Relations. He once worked in marketing for a software company and hated it, but it did teach him a lot about why software tends to get worse over time in large companies. He lives in Oregon with his cat (and his wife). He enjoys brewing beer, exploring nature, and spending time with friends. You can follow Justin on Mastodon and Bluesky, or sign up for his newsletter, Connectivity.
Areas of Expertise
January 15, 2026 Add as a preferred source on Google
Add as a preferred source on Google 
Credit: Justin Pot
Table of Contents
Say what you will about AI (and I’ve said plenty) but the progress in transcription and speech-to-text software is genuinely impressive. Whereas before such software was either clumsy or expensive, there are now all kinds of great open source tools that work well.
Which brings me to Pipit, a free Mac dictation app that works offline, meaning it’s totally private. Even more interesting, it can be used to do more than just transcribe speech—it can launch apps, toggle settings, and even launch a web search or query an AI service.
The first time you open the application, it will ask for permission to use your microphone before downloading the Parakeet model for offline transcription. Once everything is set up you can use the application by pressing and holding the Option key, then talking—the application will record what you say, turn that into text, and paste the text into the currently active text field.
I’ve been trying this for a couple of days and find that the transcriptions are generally pretty accurate, complete with punctuation. There is optional post-processing, which can turn unstructured speech into a properly formatted document, but using that requires an OpenRouter API key.
The settings window lets you change the trigger key, choose an input device, and toggle the menu bar icon. There’s also a tool for transcribing audio files, complete with speaker identification. Just drag over a file and you get a transcription.
What do you think so far?
The uploads screen for Pipit, allowing you to transcribe audio files. Credit: Justin Pot
Finally, on the Enhance tab, you can enable the Quick Actions feature. This allows you to verbally tell your computer what to do and see it happen. To use this, start transcription as normal, but say something like "open Safari" to open an app or "ask Claude" followed by a question to launch a conversation with that AI assistant in your browser. It’s a little gimmicky, granted, but I enjoyed using it.
The voice commands you can use with Pipit, as seen in the settings. Credit: Justin Pot
It’s excellent that tools like this are broadly free now, and Pipit has an interesting collection of features.
Never miss a tech story Get the latest tech news, reviews, and advice from Jake and the team.