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Comment by metalogical | Hacker News Reader

Whisper runs fine locally. So why are Willow ($144/year), Wisprflow ($120/year), and SuperWhisper ($120/year) all subscriptions?

I got frustrated paying monthly for something that could run on my Mac, so I built Lucid Voice:

- 100% offline (Nvidia Parakeet + Llama)

- $20 one-time (mainly to cover Apple's notarization costs)

- Runs on surprisingly low-end hardware (M1 base models work fine)

- No cloud, no data collection

Open to feedback on anything - pricing, the tech stack, or if this should just be free: https://lucidvoice.app

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Thanks for sharing. As someone who used dragon naturally speaking, which did fine tuning back in the 90s, i was genuinely surprised at the implementation gap.

The pricing is good for customer.

At the same time, I think you shouldn't give away "Lifetime updates" for same pricing tier. Are you planning to support it for the next 10+ years and across next 5-10 mac hardware/version without any new license cost?

Honestly not trying to make serious money from this - more validating if people want local-first tools. If it takes off, might add a support tier, but ultimate goal isn't profit. Just wanted something that works without monthly charges.

Can you build a Linux version? :-)

Still haven't managed to find one that works as well as MacWhisper.

Get your favourite coding agent to make one. These things are incredibly simple. You really only need a few ingredients:

- `sherpa-onnx` bindings for your favourite language

- package for capturing your mic input

- package for hotkey capture

- package for clipboard management (or shell out to `xclip`)

- shell out to `xdotool key --clearmodifiers "ctrl+v"` to paste

Tell it to go research all the above and then assemble into whatever form you want. I had Claude write a Go daemon that loads parakeet and runs as a systemd user service listening for Alt-Space in about 20 minutes.

Check out SpeechNote, works great on both CPU based and GPU based machines depending on the model you use: https://github.com/mkiol/dsnote

> Can you build a Linux version? :-)

Generally speaking, it is the hardware not the OS that makes it easier to build for Macs right now.

Apple Neural Engine is a sleeping giant, in the middle of all this.

Parakeet still runs at 5x realtime on a middle-of-the-road CPU; it should be quite doable (at the cost of some battery life).

Mac-only for now but might port to Linux if there's enough demand. What desktop environment are you using?

Gnome on Debian. I'm a simple man.

Good idea. I was hoping to at least see an overview of this from my phone, but when I opened the link, it said it’s for desktop only and became uninterested.

Just pushed an update for mobile - should work now. Happy to give you a free license key if you want to try it on your Mac. Would love feedback

I have been looking for this on Linux (Gnome) and would love something like it. I can't find a simple way to get system-level voice input.

Yeah, hearing this a lot. I'll definitely into Linux support

Pleaee talk me into buying your product! :-) I currently use the free version of Superwhisper on Mac.

Hey Steve! SuperWhisper free is solid - main reason to switch is avoiding subscriptions entirely. For $20 one-time you get AI formatting (removes filler words, cleans up corrections) that SuperWhisper charges $120/year for. I'm building features users ask (e.g. file transcription) for and all future updates are included. Runs light on base M1s. Not trying to maximize profit here - just testing if people actually want local-first tools vs subscriptions. If it's not worth it after a week, email support@lucidvoice.app for a refund :)

I'm pretty sold. downloaded it earlier, had an issue with Lucid not automatically appearing in the list of apps to permit accessibility permission, but after a coffee I remembered that apps can be manually added (so you can ignore my support email! :-) ). My minor niggle would be no trial option, that always puts me off slightly - although I appreciate your refund offer. Oh hell, I'll just buy it. It's worth it to reward the slick onboarding process! :-)

> - No cloud, no data collection

How can this be guaranteed if it is closed source?

Other than that, great project.

You can block it with Mac's firewall and verify zero network calls. Privacy policy at https://lucidvoice.app/privacy

Might open source if there's demand - testing that now

Some developers seem to do okay by writing open source software and selling it on the App Store. I’ve even paid for software like that :)

Does this do the formatting that wisprflow will do kind of thing?

Yes - makes corrections, removes filler words, formats naturally. That's what the Llama post-processing does

Can you open source this

you mean give it away for free? how would he require payment?

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