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Apple Dictation and Your Privacy, What Stays on Your Mac and What Goes to Apple

What Apple's own pages say about Mac Dictation, when your voice stays on your Mac, when it goes to Apple, and the one setting that lets Apple keep audio.

By Nelson, maker of Aurator

Often, yes. A Mac can turn everyday dictation into text on the Mac itself, in 48 languages and regions on Apple's own list, and Apple says Keyboard settings will tell you when that is happening. When it is not, what you say goes to Apple's servers to become text, and Apple says it does not store the audio unless you turned on a setting called Improve Siri and Dictation.

The longer answer depends on four things, a search box, your language, an Intel Mac and that one setting. So I read Apple's own privacy pages, its Mac User Guide and its macOS Feature Availability page on 7 October 2026, and everything below about Apple comes from those pages.

I make Aurator, so please read this knowing that. Aurator is a dictation app for the Mac, but this article is mostly about Apple, and honestly, Apple is quite private here.

Is Mac dictation processed on your Mac or on Apple's servers

It can be either. Apple's privacy page for Siri and Dictation says your Mac will show in Keyboard settings whether your audio and transcripts are processed on your device and not sent to Apple servers. If they are not, the things you dictate are sent to Apple's servers and processed there.

The Mac User Guide adds that this is for what Apple calls general text dictation, like writing a message or a note, and not for dictating into a search box. So the answer depends on your Mac, your language and where you are typing. And you do not have to guess, because Apple put the answer in your settings.

How do I check where my dictation goes

  1. Open the Apple menu and choose System Settings.
  2. Click Keyboard in the sidebar. You may need to scroll down.
  3. Find Dictation. It has to be turned on for the answer to show.
  4. Read the text below Dictation. Apple says it tells you whether your voice and transcripts for general dictation are processed on your Mac and not sent to Apple's servers.
  5. Click Edit next to Languages to see which languages you dictate in, because Apple's on-device list goes language by language.

Apple's troubleshooting page says that same text also tells you whether you need an internet connection to dictate, so read it before you count on dictating with no internet.

Which languages stay on the Mac

Apple's macOS Feature Availability page has two lists. On 7 October 2026, it listed Dictation for 63 languages and regions, and On-Device and Modeless Dictation for 48. Under the second list, Apple notes that it requires a download of speech models.

The on-device list is generous. I speak Spanish and English, so I was glad to see English for many regions and five versions of Spanish there.

But some languages are on the Dictation list and not on the on-device list, such as Czech, Greek, Hindi, Polish, Ukrainian, and Portuguese as spoken in Portugal. If you dictate in one of those, check the line in Keyboard settings. If you need to add a language first, here is how to change the dictation language on a Mac.

What about search boxes and Intel Macs

Apple's current guide leaves search boxes out of that line in Keyboard settings. Its older guide for macOS Monterey said it plainly, dictation in search uses server-based dictation. The current guide does not repeat that sentence, so if you dictate into a search field, do not count on it staying on your Mac.

That same Monterey guide said that on a Mac with Apple silicon, general text dictation is processed on the device in many languages and no internet connection is required. It did not say the same about Intel Macs, and the current guide does not split this by chip. So if your Mac has an Intel chip, please do not assume. Read what your own Keyboard settings say.

What Improve Siri and Dictation does, on or off

When you turn on Dictation, your Mac may ask whether you want to help improve Siri and Dictation. Share Audio Recordings lets Apple store audio of your Siri and Dictation requests from your Mac, and Apple says it may review a sample of it. Not Now does not.

With the setting off, Apple says what you dictate on its servers is processed there but not stored. It still stores related request data, such as the kind of request, device details and performance numbers. Apple says your request history, which it says includes transcripts and that related data, is linked to a random identifier made on your device. That identifier changes several times an hour and is not tied to your Apple Account.

What Apple's pages saySetting offSetting on
Apple stores the audio of what you dictateNoIt may
People review a subsetNot described for dictationGraders may, and only Apple employees review audio
History linked to a random id, not your Apple AccountYesYes
How long Apple may keep that historyUp to two yearsUp to two years, longer for the small part that was reviewed

Apple also says this history is not used to build a marketing profile and is never sold. That is a fair promise, and I want to say so.

Apple's pages do not say whether this setting changes anything for dictation that is already processed on your Mac, and I will not guess. If privacy is the reason you are reading this, the simple step is to leave it off.

How do I turn it off and delete what Apple has

To turn the setting off, Apple's Mac User Guide gives these steps.

  1. Open the Apple menu and choose System Settings.
  2. Click Privacy & Security in the sidebar.
  3. Go to Analytics & Improvements.
  4. Turn off Improve Siri & Dictation.

To delete the history Apple holds, Apple's Mac User Guide for macOS Tahoe 26 gives these steps.

  1. Open System Settings.
  2. Click Apple Intelligence & Siri in the sidebar, or Siri if that is what your sidebar shows.
  3. Click Delete Siri & Dictation History, then click Delete.

Apple says this deletes request history, both audio recordings and transcripts, that is linked to a random identifier and less than six months old. You need to be online to do it. Deleting it does not change your choice about sharing audio recordings, so if you want both, do both.

So, is Apple Dictation private

For a lot of people, yes, and I mean that. If you dictate ordinary text in a language on Apple's on-device list, on a Mac where Keyboard settings says it is processed on the Mac, and you leave Improve Siri and Dictation off, Apple's own pages describe your voice staying on your Mac. The places to watch are search boxes, other languages, Intel Macs, and that one setting.

Where Apple's built-in dictation is the better choice

I want to be fair, because the option already on your Mac is a good one.

  1. It comes with macOS. There is no app to buy or install.
  2. More languages. 63 language and region versions, 48 of them on the on-device list, against Aurator's ten languages in about thirty regional versions.
  3. Older Macs. It is part of older versions of macOS too. Aurator needs macOS 26 or later and is made for Macs with Apple silicon.

If those matter most to you, use what is already on your Mac. If you are thinking about moving off it, I looked at that in an Apple Dictation alternative for the Mac.

How Aurator answers the same questions

This is all from Aurator's own website, mostly its privacy page.

  1. Where your speech becomes text. Aurator uses Apple's speech model on your Mac. Its cleanup, which takes out sounds like um and uh, and its coach both run on your Mac.
  2. Who receives it. There is no account to create. Your dictations are not sent to me, and I do not run a server that could receive them.
  3. What goes online. Aurator checks for updates, and about once a day it checks your licence with tryaurator.app. Neither check carries your voice or your words.
  4. The cloud. Cloud is off until you turn it on in Settings with a key from your own account. Then the sound of each dictation goes to Deepgram, and the text for rewrites, voice edits, Write for me and building your voice guide goes to Anthropic, each under your own account. None of it comes to me.
  5. No internet. With Cloud off, dictation, cleanup and the coach work offline once the speech model for your language has downloaded. There is more on that in dictating offline on a Mac.

So Apple's built-in dictation can keep general dictation on your Mac too. What Aurator adds is cleanup and a coach on your Mac, and the cloud only when you choose it with your own keys. I wrote more about how other apps handle your voice in What a Privacy Policy Actually Promises About Your Voice.

What I would tell you to do

Open Keyboard settings and read the line under Dictation. Then check Improve Siri and Dictation in Privacy & Security, and turn it off if you do not want Apple to keep any audio.

If I have read any of Apple's pages wrong, please let me know. I would really like to correct it.

Aurator is a native macOS app and is not affiliated with Apple. If you want cleanup and a coach with your voice kept on your Mac by default, Aurator is at tryaurator.app/download. Seven days free, with every feature, then US$29 once.

Sources, all checked on 7 October 2026