How to Dictate in Microsoft Teams on Mac with Hearsy

Microsoft Teams has built-in transcription and Copilot for meetings, but there's no native dictation feature for typing chat messages, channel posts, or replies on the desktop app. Hearsy fills that gap by running a local speech-to-text engine on your Mac. Press a hotkey, speak, and your words appear as text in any Teams input field. No browser extension, no Microsoft 365 add-in, no audio sent to the cloud.

Step-by-step setup

1. 1

   Open Microsoft Teams on your Mac

   Launch the Teams desktop app or open Teams in your browser. Navigate to the chat, channel, or meeting conversation where you want to send a message.

2. 2

   Click the message input field

   Place your cursor in the message compose box at the bottom of the conversation. Hearsy pastes text wherever your cursor is positioned, so make sure the right input field is focused.

3. 3

   Press your Hearsy hotkey

   Trigger recording with your configured keyboard shortcut (default: Fn twice or a custom hotkey). A small indicator appears in your menu bar to confirm Hearsy is listening.

4. 4

   Speak your message

   Talk at your normal pace. Say what you'd type: a chat reply, a channel update, meeting notes, or a detailed response. Hearsy handles punctuation and capitalization automatically.

5. 5

   Press the hotkey again to finish

   Tap the hotkey once more. Hearsy transcribes your speech on-device, optionally cleans it up with AI enhancement, and pastes the result into the Teams message field. Review it and hit Enter to send.

Why use Hearsy for Microsoft Teams?

Teams is where a lot of work communication happens — chats, channel conversations, meeting follow-ups, status updates. But all of that still requires typing. Microsoft's built-in transcription is designed for meetings, not for composing messages. If you want to dictate a quick reply to a colleague or write a detailed channel post, Teams doesn't offer a way to do that natively on Mac. Hearsy adds dictation to every text field in Teams.

Hearsy processes your voice entirely on your Mac using local AI models. Nothing is uploaded to Microsoft, Hearsy's servers, or any third party. This matters in Teams environments because workplace conversations often contain sensitive project details, internal decisions, and confidential information. With Hearsy, that audio never leaves your machine.

The AI enhancement feature is especially useful for Teams, where messages often need to sound professional. Spoken words tend to be informal and meandering, but AI enhancement cleans up your dictation into clear, well-punctuated text. A rambling verbal thought becomes a polished channel post or a concise chat reply, all processed locally in under a second.

When to use voice dictation in Microsoft Teams

Tips for better results

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  Turn on AI enhancement for channel posts. It transforms casual speech into structured, professional messages that read well in a team context.

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  Dictate chat replies without breaking your flow. Click into a chat, hit the hotkey, speak your reply, and you're done in seconds — no need to stop what you're working on.

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  Use dictation during meetings to type messages in the meeting chat. Hearsy picks up your microphone input independently, so you can dictate a chat message while listening to the call.

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  Switch languages from the menu bar when messaging teammates in other regions. Parakeet supports 25 languages, Whisper supports 99+.

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  Dictate post-meeting summaries directly into a channel. Speaking a three-paragraph recap takes about 30 seconds compared to several minutes of typing.

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  For quick replies like 'I'll look into it' or 'sounds good, thanks,' dictation is faster than typing and keeps the conversation moving.