Petal – Open-source, fully local voice-to-text for macOS

Summary: Petal is a macOS menu bar app that converts voice to text entirely on-device without cloud or accounts. It supports six models from four providers, including Apple Speech, Whisper variants, Qwen3 ASR, and Voxtral Mini 3B, offering model choice and local processing.

What it does

Petal runs natively on Apple Silicon Macs with macOS 14+, providing push-to-talk or toggle voice transcription that auto-pastes text into any app. Voxtral models include a Smart Mode that removes filler words and cleans speech locally.

Who it's for

It is designed for macOS users seeking offline, customizable voice-to-text solutions without subscriptions or cloud dependencies.

Why it matters

Petal eliminates reliance on cloud services and subscription models by enabling fully local voice transcription with multiple model options.