MacWhisper vs Hearsy: File Transcription vs Real-Time Dictation

MacWhisper, by developer Jordi Bruin, is primarily an audio file transcription app for Mac. The core workflow: drop in an audio file, get a timestamped transcript. It runs Whisper locally on your device — nothing leaves your machine.

Built around batch transcription, MacWhisper handles podcasts, interview recordings, meeting audio, and video files. Notable features include 50+ export formats, speaker diarization (labeling who said what), batch processing queues, watch folders that automatically transcribe new audio, and translation pipelines via Whisper or DeepL.

MacWhisper has a secondary dictation mode — a hotkey for live voice input. But dictation is an add-on; the core design is built around processing files.

The free tier uses smaller Whisper models (Tiny and Base). Pro adds Large V2/V3, batch processing, and speaker identification as a one-time purchase.

Hearsy is a menu-bar dictation app that runs entirely on your Mac. Press a global hotkey from any app, speak, and transcribed text is pasted at your cursor. No internet connection is used during transcription. Audio is processed in local RAM by one of two AI engines: Parakeet TDT for English (under 50ms latency) or Whisper Large V3 for 99 languages. Optional AI cleanup runs locally via Qwen 2.5 by default, with no API call required.

Both MacWhisper and Hearsy are local. Neither sends audio to cloud servers during transcription.

MacWhisper processes everything on-device — audio files, dictation, batch queues. You can verify with any network monitor: no outbound audio connections during transcription.

Hearsy works the same way. Both the Parakeet and Whisper engines run in local RAM. The only time Hearsy contacts a server is if you've configured Claude or OpenAI for the text cleanup step — and even then, the request is text, not audio.

For privacy, MacWhisper and Hearsy are equivalent. Both are sound choices for sensitive environments.

For file transcription, MacWhisper with Whisper Large V3 processes audio well above real-time speed on Apple Silicon. M4 chips achieve roughly a 1:12 transcription ratio — a one-hour recording finishes in about five minutes.

For live dictation, MacWhisper's dictation mode takes ~1–2 seconds between releasing the hotkey and text appearing. Hearsy with Parakeet: under 50ms — text appears essentially the moment you release the key.

The 50ms response changes the feel of dictation. At 1–2 seconds, you speak, pause, check the screen, continue. Under 50ms, text appears before the pause registers consciously.