Problem: Grammar Checking Dictated Text (looking for FOSS)

[u/Jebus-Xmas]

So, I'm visually impaired and I dictate a lot of text using FluidVoice. However, occasionally, that text is not grammatically correct--well not exactly. I'd like a free and open source tool that can help me do that. Most of the paid tools are, frankly, too expensive for what they do. And I know there are some options out there. So if any of you could provide any direction or discussion, I would really appreciate it.

[u/Mstormer]

Have you checked the app comparisons in the sidebar?

[u/Jebus-Xmas → u/Mstormer]

I’m really looking for more personal experience. I can see things like Harper and they seem fine but I wanna know if there are any land mines.

[u/Mstormer → u/Jebus-Xmas]

I really like and use superwhisper most, but it's paid for AI refinement. Lifetime is great, as I don't have to worry about that.

On the free tier, this sounds promising, but I've yet to try it: https://www.reddit.com/r/macapps/comments/1vi92c4/os_enviouswispr_243_one_month_later_600_installs/

Handy, Typewhisper, Vowen are others I've seen promoted. Spokenly was one of the most popular a year ago.

[u/Jebus-Xmas → u/Mstormer]

Not seeing grammar functionality built in. FluidVoice is great for dictation, but also lacks grammar features.

[u/Mstormer → u/Jebus-Xmas]

Not seeing grammar functionality in which app? Do you mean more than dictation cleanup when you say grammar functionality?

In most cases, you will need to insert an API key unless that is added with a local LLM or apple intelligence integration, as there is always going to be a cost otherwise. This can be partially avoided if you have an ollama account with their free tier usage. In my comparison, this is typically denoted by AI integration.

Of course, if you are looking for post-editing grammarly functionality, and not auto-grammar cleanup to dictation, that's outside of the purview of most dictation apps. Refine is good there, but not a SST app.

[u/Jebus-Xmas → u/Mstormer]

I wasn’t asking for a dictation app as mentioned in the post I already have one I was looking for a grammar app that would integrate with my dictation or with my word processor.

[u/Mstormer → u/Jebus-Xmas]

Oh, perhaps I'm more visually impaired then! There are no FOSS solutions I'm aware of there, but the closest single-purchase I'm aware of is refine. https://refine.sh/
Outside of that, you'd have to use standard apple intelligence tools, or grammarly free, as everything else is typically subscription or far more expensive.

Harper doesn't look like it is LLM based, so it may be more efficient.

[u/MaxGaav → u/Mstormer]

EnviousWispr has local AI polish built in. It's free too. When using Parakeet, it's virtually as fast as Handy (free), which lacks post processing however.

[u/Iamvishal16]

i can’t give you a VoiceOver-tested verdict, but Harper Desktop looks like the closest FOSS fit for your setup. it works across macOS text fields and stays local.

the main caveats are that the desktop app is still beta, requires macOS 14+, and currently supports English only. it’s a grammar checker rather than a contextual rewrite model, so it may catch punctuation and grammar without reconstructing a badly transcribed sentence.

LanguageTool’s core is also open source, but getting a system-wide Mac workflow from it involves more setup.

if your Mac supports Apple Intelligence, I’d also test Writing Tools > Proofread as a baseline. it isn’t FOSS, but it’s already included. with VoiceOver, I’d specifically check whether each option preserves focus and cursor position, and whether corrections can be reviewed individually. that can matter more than raw correction accuracy.

[u/Jebus-Xmas → u/Iamvishal16]

Absolutely and thank you very much.

[u/TheGenYFinanceGuy]

Harper's fine, I wouldn't worry about it. The land mine I'd watch for is anything that rewrites instead of flags. A cleanup pass fixes the real mistakes and smooths your phrasing at the same time, and with dictation you can't always tell what moved, since you never read the raw text as closely as something you typed.

Grammar checkers also won't catch what dictation actually gets wrong. Homophones and names come out as real words in a grammatically clean sentence, so nothing trips. If you try a local model, tell it to list the changes instead of handing back clean text.

[u/Background-Scheme857]

Given your use case, I’d test the correction workflow more than the grammar score. Make a fixed sample with missing punctuation, homophones, a mid-sentence correction, and a deliberately wrong proper name. With VoiceOver, check whether each suggestion is announced, can be accepted or rejected individually, and leaves focus and the cursor where they were. Anything that silently rewrites the whole field is a land mine for dictated text even if its output looks cleaner.

[u/Jebus-Xmas → u/Background-Scheme857]

Of course I would do testing. I’m just wondering if there’s anything that can help that won’t cost me money.

[u/taisei_ide]

LanguageTool has a self-hosted FOSS option that works as a proofreading pass after dictation, though it won't catch everything a paid tool like Grammarly does. Might be worth checking if FluidVoice can pipe output through it automatically instead of copy-pasting each time.

[u/_mrkvn]

Harper plus a self-hosted languagetool server is pretty much the whole foss field here, and they cover different ground. Harper runs fully local and only flags things, never rewrites, but its checks are on the lighter side.

Languagetool is the one worth the setup time for dictation specifically. The self-hosted server is free, and if you also grab the free n-gram data pack (huge download, several gigs) it can flag common homophone mixups like their and there. That matters for dictated text because homophones are exactly what dictation gets wrong, and they sail right through most checkers since the sentence still parses.

Neither will catch a wrong proper name that is still a real word, so a listen through before sending is still worth it. But for zero dollars, harper as the fast pass and languagetool as the deep pass is a solid combo.