Your Keyboard Is for Code. Your Voice Is for Everything Else.
As a developer, you spend your keyboard time where it matters most — writing code. But between code comments, documentation, commit messages, PR descriptions, Slack replies, and emails, a surprising amount of your day is spent typing prose. Chirp lets you dictate all of that directly into any app, so you never have to leave your editor.
Works in VS Code, Terminal, and Any App
Chirp uses a global hotkey (Fn on Mac, Alt+M on Windows, both customizable) and auto-pastes transcribed text wherever your cursor is. That means it works in VS Code, JetBrains IDEs, Vim, your terminal, Slack, GitHub in a browser, or any other application. There's no plugin to install and no configuration required.
Better Commit Messages and PR Descriptions
How many times have you written a one-line commit message because typing a proper explanation felt like too much effort? With Chirp, you can speak a detailed commit message in seconds. The same goes for PR descriptions, code review comments, and issue reports. Speaking naturally tends to produce more thorough explanations than rushed typing.
Documentation Without the Pain
Writing documentation is one of those tasks developers know they should do but often skip because it's tedious. Chirp makes it faster. Dictate your README sections, API docs, inline comments, and architectural decisions. When you can speak at 150 wpm instead of typing at 40, documentation stops feeling like a chore.
A Stack You'll Appreciate
Chirp is built with technologies developers respect: Tauri 2.0 for the desktop framework, Rust for performance-critical backend logic, and whisper.cpp (the open-source C/C++ port of OpenAI's Whisper model) for speech recognition. The app uses the ggml-tiny.en-q5_0 quantized model (~30MB), delivering fast transcription with a tiny footprint.
On macOS with Apple Silicon, Chirp takes advantage of Metal acceleration for even faster inference. The entire app is roughly 95MB — smaller than most Electron apps.
100% Offline and Private
No API calls, no cloud processing, no telemetry surprises. Chirp runs entirely on your local machine. Your voice recordings and transcriptions never leave your computer. For developers working on proprietary code or under NDA, this is a hard requirement that Chirp meets by default.
Lightweight and Stays Out of Your Way
Chirp runs from the system tray and uses minimal resources. It launches at login if you want it to, responds instantly to its hotkey, and disappears when you don't need it. With 3 themes (Light, Dark, and Vampire) and 13+ settings, you can configure it to match your workflow and aesthetic preferences.
Try It Free
Chirp includes 28 free transcriptions with no account required. Unlimited use is $9.99 per year. Available on macOS (Intel + Apple Silicon), Windows 10+, and Linux (.deb and .AppImage).