Speech to text in Outlook on your Mac

Yes, you can dictate email in Outlook on a Mac, and you don't need a Microsoft 365 subscription to do it well. With Sayburst you click into a reply, hold fn, say what you'd say to the person, and let go. The email lands in the message body with a greeting, real paragraphs and a sign-off, and your voice never leaves the Mac.

Outlook has its own Dictate button, and it's worth knowing what it does and doesn't do. Sayburst is for the person who answers forty emails a day and wants them to read like they were typed carefully.

#How to set it up

1. Install Sayburst and allow two permissions. Microphone lets it hear you; Accessibility lets it type into Outlook and every other app. The speech model downloads once, and from then on recognition runs on your Mac.
2. Give Outlook the Email mode. In Sayburst's settings, assign the Email writing mode to Outlook. Every dictation in Outlook then comes out shaped like an email, while Slack or Messages can keep a casual mode. If you use Outlook in a browser, pick Email from the menu bar icon before you dictate.
3. Open a reply, hold fn, talk. Click into the body, hold fn, speak, release. For a longer message, tap fn once to go hands-free and tap it again when you're done.

It works the same in the Outlook app, in Outlook on the web, and in the subject line or a calendar invite's notes. Anywhere Outlook lets you type, Sayburst can type.

#Three emails, as said and as sent

A reschedule, with a change of mind halfway through.

You say:

"Hi Marcus, um, thanks for sending the deck. Can we move our review to Thursday at two, actually no, Thursday at three thirty, I've got a client call until three. Thanks, Priya."

What lands in Outlook:

Hi Marcus,

Thanks for sending the deck. Can we move our review to Thursday at 3:30? I have a client call until 3.

Thanks, Priya

The "um" is gone, and Sayburst Writer, the optional AI model that runs on your Mac, kept the time you meant instead of both of them.

An invoice follow-up where the numbers matter.

"Hello accounts team. New paragraph. Invoice 4471 for eight thousand two hundred and fifty dollars was due on the twelfth, uh, could you confirm when it's scheduled for payment? Best, Daniel."

The filler goes, "new paragraph" becomes a break after the greeting, and the figures stay the figures. If an AI rewrite would ever change a number you spoke, Sayburst types the cleaned transcript instead, so an invoice amount can't quietly drift.

A quick internal answer with a list.

"Quick answer on the offsite. Bullet point the venue is confirmed. Bullet point catering still needs a headcount. Bullet point I'll send the agenda Friday."

That becomes a one-line intro and three bullets, ready to send to the team.

#Outlook Dictate vs Sayburst

Outlook for Mac includes Dictate (Message › Dictate, or ⌥F1). Here's how it compares, based on Microsoft's support page, checked October 31, 2026.

Microsoft says its service doesn't store your audio or transcripts, and that your speech is sent to Microsoft to produce the text. If you already pay for Microsoft 365 and dictate a few lines a week, Dictate is right there and free to you. If email is a large part of your day, the cleanup and layout save you the edit pass, and the same key works in Teams, Word, Slack and your browser.

#Where your words go

• Recognition: your voice turns into text on your Mac. Sayburst never uploads audio.
• Cleanup: removing fillers, fixing capitals and punctuation, and the Email layout all run on the Mac too.
• The optional writer: Sayburst Writer runs on your Mac. If you choose to connect a cloud provider with your own API key instead, only the transcribed text goes to that provider, and Sayburst shows you exactly what will be sent before you switch it on.
• Outlook itself: once the text is in the message, it's an Outlook email like any other. It syncs and sends through your Microsoft or work account under that account's rules.

If your company decides what tools may touch email, that's still their call. Keeping your voice on the Mac just means there's one less place your words go.

#Tips for Outlook

• Let Outlook add your signature. If Outlook inserts a signature automatically, finish your dictation at the last sentence and skip saying your name.
• Add replacements for things you type all the time. Map "my calendar link" to your booking URL or "the dial-in" to your meeting number, and say the phrase instead of pasting it.
• Teach it names. Add clients, colleagues and product names to Sayburst's vocabulary. Correct a name by hand after a dictation and Sayburst offers to add it for you.
• Fix a draft without retyping it. Select a paragraph, hold the rewrite shortcut and say "make this more direct" or "shorter, and keep the dates". The selection is replaced in place.
• Don't run two dictation tools at once. If you sometimes use Outlook's Dictate with ⌥F1, turn it off before you hold fn, or both will try to listen.

More on writing email by voice in our email dictation guide, and step-by-step help for Outlook's own feature in how to dictate in Outlook on a Mac. If you also live in Gmail, the same setup works there: see speech to text in Gmail.

#Limits worth knowing

Sayburst inserts the message when you finish speaking, not word by word while you talk; the overlay shows your words live so you can see it's hearing you. It writes text and doesn't send, file or flag email for you. It needs an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 14 or later, so it won't help with Outlook on Windows or on your phone; those have their own dictation built in. Sayburst pastes into the focused field and restores your clipboard afterwards, so a field that blocks pasting won't accept it. If that happens, the text is kept and ⌃⌥⌘V pastes it wherever you want.

Questions people ask

Does Outlook for Mac have speech to text?

Yes. Outlook for Mac has a Dictate button under Message (or Option + F1), but Microsoft says it's only for Microsoft 365 subscribers and needs a reliable internet connection. Sayburst works in Outlook too, with any license and with no connection after the model download.

How do I use voice to text in Outlook on a Mac without a subscription?

Install Sayburst, click into the message body in Outlook, hold fn, speak, and let go. Sayburst types the text at your cursor. It's a one-time $29 purchase after a 7-day free trial, not a subscription.

Does Sayburst work in Outlook on the web?

Yes. Sayburst types into whatever field has focus, so it works in the Outlook app and in Outlook in Safari, Chrome or any other browser on your Mac.

Is Sayburst an Outlook add-in?

No. It's a Mac app that types like a keyboard. Nothing is installed in Outlook and Sayburst never signs in to your Microsoft account or reads your mailbox.