Voice-to-Text

A cross-platform background application for speech input via Push-to-Talk. Transcribes locally using OpenAI Whisper (GPU-accelerated) and optionally corrects text via the Anthropic API (Haiku). The transcribed text is automatically pasted into the active application — editor, browser, or terminal.

Supports Windows 11 and macOS.

Features

• Push-to-Talk — hold a configurable hotkey to record, release to transcribe and paste
• Local transcription — runs Whisper on your GPU, no cloud dependency for speech-to-text
• Optional AI correction — fixes grammar and punctuation via Anthropic API
• Live VU meter — pill-shaped overlay at the bottom of the screen reacts to your voice
• Smart paste — auto-detects window type and uses the appropriate paste method
• Configurable via tray menu — hotkey, model size, language, auto-correction
• Persistent settings — saved to settings.json, survives restarts
• Cross-platform — Windows (CUDA) and macOS (MPS / CPU)

Requirements

• Python 3.13+
• OpenAI Whisper with PyTorch

Windows

• NVIDIA GPU with CUDA support (tested with RTX 3070, 8 GB VRAM)
• PyTorch with CUDA
• Packages: pywin32

macOS

• Apple Silicon (MPS acceleration) or Intel (CPU fallback)
• PyTorch with MPS support (macOS 12.3+)
• Accessibility permissions required (System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility)

Both platforms

• openai-whisper, anthropic, pystray, Pillow, numpy, sounddevice

Installation

pip install sounddevice

All other dependencies should already be present (PyTorch, Whisper, Anthropic SDK, etc.).

macOS additional setup

Grant Accessibility permissions to your terminal or Python to allow global hotkey detection and keystroke simulation:

System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility → add Terminal / iTerm2 / Python

API Key

For optional text correction, an Anthropic API key is required. Create a .env file in the project root:

ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-ant-...

Usage

# With console output (for debugging)
python main.py

# Without console window (Windows only)
pythonw main.py

Action	Description
Hold hotkey	Start recording (VU meter reacts live)
Release hotkey	Stop recording, transcribe, paste into active app
Right-click tray icon	Settings and quit

VU Meter Overlay

State	Display
Idle	Dark segments, semi-transparent
Recording	Live level: green → yellow → red
Transcribing	All segments yellow
Done	All segments green (briefly)

Settings (Tray Menu)

• Hotkey — Ctrl+Space, Alt+Space, Ctrl+F9, F13, and more
• Model — Whisper model size: tiny, small, medium, large-v3, turbo
• Language — auto, Deutsch, English
• Auto-Correction — text correction via Anthropic API on/off

Settings are saved to settings.json and persist across restarts.

GPU Acceleration

The application auto-detects the best available compute device:

Platform	Device	Notes
Windows + NVIDIA	CUDA	Best performance
macOS Apple Silicon	MPS	Good performance on M1/M2/M3
Any	CPU	Fallback, slower

Autostart

# Enable
python setup_autostart.py

# Disable
python setup_autostart.py --disable

• Windows: adds a registry entry under HKCU\...\Run
• macOS: creates a LaunchAgent plist in ~/Library/LaunchAgents/

Project Structure

voice-to-text/
  main.py                                Entry point
  setup_autostart.py                     Autostart management (Windows + macOS)
  requirements.txt
  src/
    voice_to_text/
      __init__.py
      __main__.py                        python -m voice_to_text
      app.py                             Main orchestration
      audio.py                           Microphone recording (sounddevice)
      config.py                          Configuration + persistent settings
      hotkey.py                          Hotkey dispatcher
      overlay.py                         VU meter overlay (tkinter)
      paste.py                           Paste dispatcher
      transcriber.py                     Whisper + Anthropic API
      tray.py                            System tray menu (pystray)
      platform/
        __init__.py                      Platform detection
        hotkey_win.py                    Windows: GetAsyncKeyState polling
        hotkey_mac.py                    macOS: Quartz event tap
        paste_win.py                     Windows: win32 clipboard + SendInput
        paste_mac.py                     macOS: pbcopy + osascript
        overlay_win.py                   Windows: Win32 layered window
        overlay_mac.py                   macOS: tkinter alpha

Paste Detection (Windows)

On Windows, the tool detects the foreground window type:

• Standard apps (editor, browser, IDE) → Ctrl+V
• Windows Terminal → Ctrl+Shift+V
• mintty / Git Bash → Shift+Insert
• Legacy cmd.exe → Shift+Insert

On macOS, Cmd+V is used universally.

License

MIT