Is live dictation on by default in Talk DAT!?
No. It ships off. In Settings, under Local models, turn on Show words while I speak. From then on, holding the trigger on a local model shows the text so far in the Talk DAT! bar while you speak.
Live dictation · Windows
Live dictation on Windows: see the words while you are still speaking.
Talk DAT! (often written TalkDAT) is in public beta for Windows and Mac. Install the Windows build from the Microsoft Store; a separate Mac beta covers Apple silicon on macOS 14 or later.
Most dictation makes you wait. Hold the key, talk, let go, and only then does the text appear, so a sentence that went wrong is discovered after it has landed. Talk DAT! can show you the words as you say them, on your own PC, and still deliver the same finished text when you let go.
About 1.2 s behind your voice, measured. On a local model, with the switch on, the Talk DAT! bar shows the text so far while you hold the key. Measured at 0.42 s per decode on an RTX 3090 and 0.38 s on six CPU cores, so it is not a GPU-only feature. Nothing leaves the machine.
Words appear while you talk.
Hold Ctrl+Win and speak. On the Local route, with Show words while I speak switched on, the Talk DAT! bar shows the text so far and keeps correcting the last few words as you go. Let go, and the finished text is produced exactly as it is with the preview off: cleaned, punctuated, and delivered into the app you were typing in.
The switch ships off. It lives in Settings, under Local models. Turning it on changes nothing about what gets typed; it changes only what you can see while you are still holding the key.
How fast it is.
The preview decodes the last 8 seconds of audio every 0.8 seconds on the on-device model, NVIDIA Parakeet TDT 0.6B v3 by default. Measured on the machine this was built on, one decode took 0.42 s on an RTX 3090 and 0.38 s on six CPU cores, which is why the preview runs on a laptop with no discrete graphics as well as on a workstation.
On a slower machine the cadence stretches to twice the decode time rather than refusing to run, so the preview never steals the CPU the dictation itself needs. What you see is roughly 1.2 seconds behind your voice: the cadence plus one decode.
The live preview does not change the final text.
Talk DAT! does not type an early guess and then patch it. The preview is only what the Talk DAT! bar shows. When you release the key, the full take goes through the same recognition and the same finish it always did, so the text that lands is the same with the preview on or off. An automated test checks this.
Your voice stays on your PC. While the preview is running, your audio and text are not uploaded. The preview runs on the Local route only, and there is no Talk DAT! server that receives your audio or text.
Who this is for.
Anyone who thinks faster than they type. Long-form writers who want to see a sentence go wrong before it is typed. People composing a prompt for Cursor or Claude Code who want to see the instruction forming rather than discover it after. And anyone whose PC has no discrete graphics card, because the preview runs on six CPU cores at the same speed.
It runs on the Local route only, and it is not on by default. Turning it on is one switch in Settings.
Questions about live dictation on Windows.
Straight answers, matching what the product actually does today.
Does live dictation on Windows need the internet?
Not in Talk DAT!. The live preview runs on the on-device model, NVIDIA Parakeet TDT 0.6B v3 by default, so nothing is uploaded while you speak and it works with the connection off.
How far behind my voice is the live text?
About 1.2 seconds. The preview decodes a rolling 8-second window every 0.8 seconds; measured on an RTX 3090 that decode took 0.42 seconds, and on six CPU cores 0.38 seconds, so it is not a GPU-only feature.
Does the live preview change what gets typed?
No. The preview is only what the Talk DAT! bar shows while you hold the key. When you let go, the finished text is produced exactly as it is with the preview off, so the text you get is the same either way.
Does a bring-your-own-key route show words live too?
No. The live preview runs on the Local route only. With your own provider key, the text appears when you let go, and there is no Talk DAT! server route for live words.
What does Talk DAT! cost?
Nothing. Talk DAT! is free to download and use, and no account is needed to dictate. Sign-in is optional.
Try live dictation on your PC.
Talk DAT! is free, and no account is needed to dictate. Turn on Show words while I speak under Local models and try it on your own PC.