VoxPen Desktop (語墨桌面版)

繁體中文 | Website

System-tray voice-to-text app for Windows and Linux. Press a global hotkey to dictate, and the transcribed + refined text is automatically pasted at the cursor position in any app.

Built with Tauri v2 (Rust backend + React frontend), BYOK (Bring Your Own Key).

Screenshots

General Settings	Speech Settings

Refinement Settings	License & Usage

Floating recording indicator

Features

• Global hotkey — works system-wide in any app, no input method switching
• Hold-to-dictate or toggle recording mode
• STT providers — Groq Whisper, OpenAI transcription models, or custom endpoint
• Reliable failures — long live recordings are chunked; provider errors stay visible and can be retried from history
• LLM refinement — auto-remove filler words, fix grammar, add punctuation
• Auto-paste — transcription goes straight to cursor position
• Translation mode — translate speech to a target language
• Multi-language — Auto-detect, 中文, English, 日本語
• Audio ducking — automatically lower other apps' volume while recording
• Floating overlay — recording/processing status indicator with readable errors
• Transcription history — searchable SQLite database with failed-recording retry
• No telemetry — your API keys stay local (encrypted storage)

Download

Download the latest release from Releases.

Platform	File	Notes
Windows x64	.exe (NSIS installer)	No admin required
Linux x64	.AppImage / .deb	AppImage works on most distros
Linux x64 (Arch)	voxpen-desktop (native binary)	For Arch Linux / rolling-release distros

Windows: Not code-signed. Click "More info" → "Run anyway" if SmartScreen blocks it.

Wayland Auto-Paste

On Wayland sessions, VoxPen uses ydotool (kernel-level /dev/uinput) to simulate Ctrl+V for auto-paste. This works on all Wayland compositors (KDE Plasma, GNOME, sway, Hyprland, etc.). Falls back to wtype on wlroots-based compositors if ydotool is unavailable.

Distro	Install	Setup
Arch / Manjaro	sudo pacman -S ydotool	systemctl --user enable --now ydotool + sudo usermod -aG input $USER (re-login)
Debian / Ubuntu 24.04+	sudo apt install ydotool	systemctl --user enable --now ydotool + sudo usermod -aG input $USER (re-login)
Fedora	sudo dnf install ydotool	systemctl --user enable --now ydotool + sudo usermod -aG input $USER (re-login)

On X11, neither ydotool nor wtype is needed — VoxPen uses enigo (libxdo) directly.

Arch Linux / Rolling-Release Distros

The AppImage bundles Ubuntu's WebKit libraries which may be ABI-incompatible with newer system libraries (e.g. on Arch, Fedora Rawhide). Use the native binary instead:

1. Install system dependencies:

   sudo pacman -S webkit2gtk-4.1 libayatana-appindicator ydotool wl-clipboard xdotool

2. Download voxpen-desktop from the latest release
3. Make it executable and place it in your PATH:

   chmod +x voxpen-desktop
   cp voxpen-desktop ~/.local/bin/voxpen

Note: The manual copy above installs only the binary. For Wayland auto-paste support, use the install script below, which also installs the required helper script and desktop entry.

Install Script (Build from Source)

An install script is provided for Linux users who build from source. It installs the binary, resources (auto-paste helper script), desktop entry, and icon:

git clone https://github.com/soanseng/voxpen-desktop.git
cd voxpen-desktop
pnpm install
npx tauri build
./scripts/install-linux.sh            # install
./scripts/install-linux.sh uninstall  # remove

The script installs to ~/.local/bin/ and checks for required Wayland dependencies.

Debian / Ubuntu

1. Download the .deb or .AppImage from the latest release
2. For Wayland auto-paste support (Ubuntu 24.04+):

   sudo apt install ydotool
   systemctl --user enable --now ydotool
   sudo usermod -aG input $USER   # re-login required

   On older Debian/Ubuntu versions, ydotool may not be in the official repos. Build from source or use X11 where enigo works natively.

Licensing

VoxPen Desktop uses a freemium model with LemonSqueezy license keys.

• Free tier — limited daily usage
• Pro tier — unlimited usage with a license key

You can purchase a license key from the app's settings page. Enter the key in Settings → License to activate Pro features. The source code is fully open — you are free to build and modify the app yourself.

Build from Source

Prerequisites

• Node.js (LTS)
• pnpm
• Rust (stable)
• Linux (Debian/Ubuntu): libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev libgtk-3-dev libappindicator3-dev librsvg2-dev libasound2-dev libxdo-dev patchelf
• Linux (Arch): webkit2gtk-4.1 libayatana-appindicator

Steps

git clone https://github.com/soanseng/voxpen-desktop.git
cd voxpen-desktop
pnpm install
cargo tauri dev          # development
cargo tauri build        # production build

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome!

macOS Build — Help Wanted

macOS builds are not currently available because the CI environment lacks code signing and notarization setup. If you have experience with:

• Apple Developer code signing in GitHub Actions
• Tauri macOS DMG builds and notarization
• Universal binary builds (x86_64 + aarch64)

Please consider contributing a PR to add macOS support to the release workflow. The build matrix entry is already prepared — it just needs signing configuration. See .github/workflows/release.yml.

Development

# Run tests
cargo test --manifest-path src-tauri/Cargo.toml

# Lint
cargo clippy --manifest-path src-tauri/Cargo.toml -- -D warnings

# Frontend
pnpm dev
pnpm build

License

MIT