Dictation is fast, but what comes out is often a run-on paragraph with missing punctuation, filler words, repeated phrases and a few words the phone misheard. An AI model can clean that up in seconds. Dictate as you normally would, paste the text into an AI chat and ask it to fix punctuation and obvious errors while keeping your words, or to reshape it into an email, a text or bullet notes. Ask it to flag any word it had to guess, and check names and numbers yourself. Do both steps on the phone and your words never leave it.
Why does voice-to-text come out messy? #
Speech recognition turns sounds into words, and speech isn’t written language:
- No punctuation unless you say “comma” and “period” out loud.
- Filler and false starts: “so, um, I was thinking, I mean, we could…”
- Sound-alike words: “their” for “there,” “wait” for “weight,” or a name spelled three ways.
- Run-on sentences, because we don’t talk in tidy paragraphs.
- Unfamiliar words: names, jargon and brand names often come out wrong.
A language model is good at exactly this repair job, because it can use the context of the whole passage to tell what you meant.
The two-step workflow #
- Dictate with your keyboard’s microphone button, in a notes app or straight into a message field. Don’t worry about punctuation or getting it perfect. Just talk.
- Clean it up. Copy the text, paste it into an AI chat, and use one of the prompts below. Copy the result back to where it’s going.
Prompts that work #
Light cleanup, keep my words
Fix the punctuation, capitalization and obvious speech-recognition errors in this dictated text. Remove filler words like “um” and “you know.” Don’t change my wording otherwise. Put any word you had to guess in [brackets].
Turn it into an email
This is a dictated draft. Turn it into a clear email to my landlord, under 120 words, polite but firm. Keep every fact I mention and don’t add any new ones.
Turn it into a text message
Make this into a short, casual text to my sister. Keep it under 40 words.
Turn rambling into notes
This is me thinking out loud about a work project. Turn it into bullet points grouped under Decisions, To do and Questions. Keep my wording where possible.
Fix misheard words only
These notes were dictated while walking. List any words that look like speech-recognition mistakes, with your best guess for each, and then give me the corrected text.
Keep names right
Clean up this dictated text. The names that appear are Siobhan, Nguyen and Marchetti. Use those spellings.
The “bracket your guesses” instruction is the single most useful habit. It shows you exactly where to double-check.
What to watch out for #
AI cleanup is reliable for punctuation and filler, and less reliable for meaning:
- It can “fix” things you meant. An unusual word choice or deliberate phrasing may get smoothed away. Say “keep my wording” when that matters.
- Numbers and names. A misheard number looks just as plausible corrected wrongly. Always check amounts, dates, times and names against what you said.
- Added content. Asked to write an email, a model may add a sign-off or a detail you didn’t mention. “Don’t add any new facts” helps.
For proofreading text you typed rather than dictated, see our private grammar checker guide.
Is dictation private? #
That depends on the keyboard and the language. iPhone dictation now runs on the device for many languages, which we explain in offline speech to text on your phone. Android keyboards differ, and third-party keyboards may send audio or text to their servers. Our guide to keyboard privacy covers the details.
For recordings you already have, like voice memos, lectures or meetings, you need a transcription app rather than keyboard dictation. Look for one that transcribes on the device, so the audio is never uploaded.
Clean up dictation privately on your phone #
Once your words are text, the cleanup step can stay private too. Personal LLM runs AI models on your phone, with no account and nothing uploaded. It has no voice input of its own, so dictate in your keyboard or a notes app, then paste the text in. Save a cleanup prompt as the chat’s system prompt and you only have to paste each time:
You clean up dictated text. Fix punctuation, capitalization and obvious speech-recognition errors, remove filler words, and keep my wording. Put any word you had to guess in [brackets]. Reply with the cleaned text only.
Use the Precise preset so it sticks closely to what you said, and copy the result back with one tap. It works in airplane mode, which is handy for dictating notes on a train or plane.
Frequently asked questions #
How do I fix punctuation in voice-to-text? #
Either say punctuation out loud as you dictate (“comma,” “period,” “new paragraph”), or dictate naturally and paste the text into an AI with a prompt asking it to fix punctuation and capitalization without changing your words. The second way is faster for long passages.
Can AI remove filler words from dictated text? #
Yes. Ask it to remove “um,” “uh,” “like,” “you know” and repeated false starts while keeping your wording. Most models do this well, even small ones running on a phone.
Why does voice typing get words wrong? #
Speech recognition guesses words from sounds, so sound-alike words, names, jargon, accents and background noise cause errors. AI cleanup can fix many of them from context, but check names and numbers yourself.
Is voice typing private? #
It depends on your keyboard and language. Many phones now process dictation on the device, but some keyboards send audio or text to servers. Check your keyboard’s settings, and prefer on-device dictation for sensitive notes.
Can AI turn my spoken notes into a to-do list? #
Yes. Dictate your thoughts, paste the text into an AI chat and ask for bullet points grouped into tasks, decisions and questions. Check that nothing important was dropped.