A Spokenly Alternative that lives in your notch
Spokenly is generous: Whisper and Parakeet models run offline for free with no usage limits, you can bring your own OpenAI, Deepgram or Groq keys for free, and Pro — $99.99 a year — adds high-accuracy cloud models without keys. It runs on macOS, Windows, Linux and iOS. Notchy's dictation uses Apple's on-device speech model, pastes into whatever app had focus when you stop, ends itself after 2.5 seconds of silence and never runs longer than two minutes.
Looking for Spokenly itself? It lives at spokenly.app.
- Spokenly price
- Free with local models or your own API keys; Pro $99.99/year
- Spokenly requires
- macOS, Windows, Linux and iOS
- Notchy price
- $24.99 one-time, 7-day free trial
Why use Notchy instead of Spokenly?
- One app instead of another app
If you already want a notch app, Notchy's dictation comes with it — no second menu bar icon, no second set of permissions.
- Zero model management
No models to download or keys to paste. Apple's on-device recogniser is already on your Mac.
- Visible, self-closing mic
A live chip in the notch shows the word count while listening, and the session ends itself on silence.
- Where Spokenly does more
Choice of Whisper, Parakeet and cloud models, bring-your-own-key, Windows, Linux and iOS apps. For accuracy on hard audio, Spokenly's models win.
Everything Notchy does, in one app
- Fluid Dynamic Island animations on the Mac notch
- Command palette (⌃⌥K) — every action one keystroke away
- Knock — double-tap a modifier key to open the notch
- AI usage tracker (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Copilot)
- Detach any tab into a menu-bar popover
- Now Playing music controls (Apple Music & Spotify)
- Time-synced karaoke lyrics under the notch
- Mac clipboard history shelf (password-manager safe)
- Searchable clipboard — filter by text, file name, or OCR'd words
- On-device OCR — copy a screenshot, get its text (Apple Vision)
- Window snapping — drag a window to the notch to tile it
- App Launcher — pin apps to the notch, open with one tap
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- Text snippets — TextExpander-style pastes from the ⌘K palette
- One-tap screen capture to clipboard + shelf
- Color eyedropper — sample any pixel, hex auto-copied
- System-wide mic mute for every meeting app at once
- Keystroke HUD for demos & screencasts (secure-input safe)
- Keyboard cleaning lock with countdown island (⌘⎋ unlocks)
- Menu-bar icon hiding — Bartender-style separator & chevron
- Live CPU / memory / network stats flyout
- Custom islands through the local developer API (off by default)
- iPhone-style call island — Answer/Decline FaceTime on the notch
- Notch Terminal — real VT100/xterm shell in a PTY, its own tab
- Camera Guard — alert (or block) when any app opens your camera
- Caps Lock HUD — brief island on every toggle
- Full Charge island with adjustable threshold + low-battery sound
- Alt HUD styles — edge-pinned bar or circular gauge off the notch
- Audio-reactive Now Playing visualizer (real FFT of system audio)
- Custom closed-notch idle animation — drop in your own Lottie JSON
- Drag-and-drop file drop shelf — persists across relaunches
- Zip & unzip files right from the shelf
- Image converter (HEIC, PNG, JPEG, TIFF, PDF) + video → GIF
- Run Apple Shortcuts with one tap
- Screenshots auto-staged on the shelf, ready to drag
- Download finished alerts with Reveal in Finder
- USB drive mount island with one-tap Eject
- Apple Reminders quick capture & due list
- macOS Pomodoro notch timer & stopwatch — streaks + 7-day chart
- Resizable expanded panel (width & height, live preview)
- System HUDs (volume, brightness, battery)
- Audio output switcher (speakers, AirPods, monitor)
- AirPods connection manager & battery
- Magic Mouse, Keyboard & Trackpad battery + low-battery alerts
- Quick notes & Calendar widgets
- Camera Mirror (check your appearance)
- Keep Awake (caffeine toggle)
- Teleprompter (Cuely) for Zoom calls
- Focus-aware alerts & native haptic feedback
- Lock screen widgets & hide-the-notch mode
- 134 languages, fully localized
- Native SwiftUI, tuned for Apple silicon
The honest verdict on Spokenly
Spokenly is one of the best free dedicated dictation apps, and it's cross-platform. Notchy is for Mac users who'd rather have dictation as one tool in the notch than install a separate app for it.
Spokenly alternative — FAQ
Is Spokenly free?
Yes for local models and for your own API keys, with no limits. Pro, with built-in cloud models, is $99.99 a year, per spokenly.app.
Spokenly or Notchy for dictation?
Spokenly if dictation is the whole job and you want the best model. Notchy if you want simple offline dictation as part of a $24.99 Dynamic Island toolkit.
Does Notchy support Whisper models?
No. Notchy uses Apple's built-in on-device speech recognition.
Does Notchy need an API key?
No keys, no account and no network — recognition is local.