Dictation commands

Everything QUILL Lite and QUILL’s Live Dictation understand, generated from the table the program itself reads – so this list and the program cannot disagree. In either program, say what can I say while dictating to open the same list.

How the commands work

Punctuation and layout words can go anywhere in a phrase: “dear Sam comma new paragraph thank you for the letter”.
Commands only work as a whole phrase, said on their own after a pause. “Delete that line of text” in a sentence is just words.
With “Just write what I say” switched on in Dictation Settings, commands are written as words too; punctuation, layout and the stop phrase still work.
Say “literal” before any of these to write the word instead: “literal comma” writes comma.
Moonshine, Whisper, every downloaded model, OpenAI and the speech providers add punctuation by themselves; saying it yourself always wins. With Windows speech recognition, say all of it.
Some commands take words after them: select the cat, paste clip three, insert snippet sign off. They work only at the start of a phrase.
The Markdown line marks – “bullet”, “numbered item”, “block quote” and “heading one” to “heading six” – count only at the start of a phrase, so “the heading two lines down” stays words.
A snippet with blanks asks for each one by name: say the answer, or for a choice say one of the options or choose and its number. Say skip to leave one empty, scratch that to go back one, or cancel to type nothing. Then the whole snippet goes in as one phrase, and scratch that takes all of it back.

The command word

Say “QUILL” first to give a command instead of dictating: “QUILL scratch that”. It counts only as the first word after a pause, so “I told QUILL about it” is written as words.
Every command in this list works after the command word. If what follows it is not a command, nothing is typed: you hear “Not a command”, and “QUILL type that” writes it after all.
Say “literal QUILL” to write the word itself.
With “Commands only after the command word” switched on in More Dictation Settings (it is on in QUILL Transcribe), a command said on its own is written as words, except the stop phrase.
Speak a Command (F11 in QUILL and QUILL Lite, and in QUILL Transcribe the Command Key you choose) does the same without the word: the next thing you say is a command. Press it twice for command mode.

Say, after the command word	What happens
“type that” or “write that”	Writes the words that were just refused as not a command, once.
“command mode”	Everything you say is a command, with no command word, until you say dictation mode or stop giving commands for a few seconds. You hear a falling tone when it ends.
“dictation mode”	Leaves command mode at once: what you say is written again.

Review before inserting

Say “QUILL review that” to take the last phrase back out and hold it in Review Dictation (Shift+F4), where you can read it, edit it, ask the AI to change it and insert it once. Nothing is written until you insert it.
While the review is open, what you say is written into it. Say the command word first to give an instruction instead, or turn on Talk About It in the window.
Changing words with AI needs AI help switched on and your ChatGPT subscription or your own AI key. With AI off, the review still lets you edit and insert.
“QUILL polish that” asks the AI to fix punctuation, capitals and small slips and keep your words. It works only after you turn on Allow polishing my dictation with AI in More Dictation Settings, and nothing is sent until you agree.

Say, after the command word	What happens
“review that” or “review it”	Takes the last phrase back out, or the words held while paused, and opens it in Review Dictation to read, change and insert. With AI off, the words stay where they were written.
“make it shorter” or “more formal” or “fix the grammar only”	While reviewing: asks the AI to change the words. Anything else said after the command word while reviewing is an instruction too. You hear what changed.
“what changed”	While reviewing: says again what the last change did.
“read it back” or “read it”	While reviewing: reads the whole text.
“undo that change” or “undo the change”	While reviewing: takes back the last change.
“back to what i said”	While reviewing: puts back the words exactly as you said them.
“polish that” or “polish it”	Asks the AI to fix punctuation, capitals and small slips in the words, keeping your words; opens the last phrase in Review Dictation first. Only when Allow polishing my dictation with AI is on, and only after you agree to send. You hear what changed; nothing is inserted until you insert it.
“insert it”	While reviewing: writes the text where it was going, once.
“discard it”	While reviewing: throws the text away; nothing is written.

Profiles and formatting

A profile is the kind of writing dictation is for: Standard, Email, Document, Markdown, Chat, Coding, Verbatim. Standard is your Dictation Settings as they are, and is where everybody starts.
Choose one in More Dictation Settings in QUILL and QUILL Lite, or in QUILL Transcribe’s Dictation menu (Dictation Profile, Ctrl+Shift+F) or tray menu. Or say its name after the command word: “QUILL email mode”.
A profile sets the pause, whether filler words are removed and whether punctuation is added, and how headings, bold and italic are written.
Markdown and Coding write “heading two” as two number signs, and “bold that” as two asterisks either side. Document and Email use the editor’s own Heading and Bold in a document that holds formatting; anywhere else they type nothing for them and say why. Chat and Verbatim write plain text.
Lock Profile stops a spoken profile name switching profiles; you can still choose one by hand. Nothing ever switches profiles on its own.

Correcting yourself as you talk

With Fix it when I correct myself turned on in Dictation Settings, saying “no”, “I mean”, “no I mean”, “sorry” or “scratch that word” between two days, months, numbers or names from My Words writes only the second: “Thursday, no, Friday” writes Friday. Anything else is written as said.
When you correct the same word the same way twice, with “correct that” and “choose”, or in QUILL’s own documents with “correct” and the word, dictation offers to remember it: “Add a correction: Ann becomes Anne?” In QUILL and QUILL Lite a window asks. Where no window can be shown the question is spoken: say “QUILL yes” to add it or “QUILL no” within 30 seconds. Nothing is added without a yes.

Punctuation

Say	Writes
period	`.`
full stop	`.`
comma	`,`
question mark	`?`
exclamation point	`!`
exclamation mark	`!`
colon	`:`
semicolon	`;`
ellipsis	`...`
open quote	the quotation mark “
begin quote	the quotation mark “
close quote	the quotation mark “
end quote	the quotation mark “
open single quote	`'`
close single quote	`'`
apostrophe	`'`

Brackets

Say	Writes
open parenthesis	`(`
open paren	`(`
left parenthesis	`(`
close parenthesis	`)`
close paren	`)`
right parenthesis	`)`
open bracket	`[`
left bracket	`[`
close bracket	`]`
right bracket	`]`
open brace	`{`
close brace	`}`
open angle bracket	`<`
close angle bracket	`>`

Dashes and joining

Say	Writes
hyphen	`-`
dash	a dash, written as em dash, no spaces (word—word)
slash	`/`
forward slash	`/`
backslash	`\`
underscore	`_`

Symbols

Say	Writes
at sign	`@`
hash sign	`#`
number sign	`#`
dollar sign	`$`
percent sign	`%`
ampersand	`&`
asterisk	`*`
plus sign	`+`
minus sign	`-`
equals sign	`=`

Lines and layout

Say	Writes
new line	a line break
newline	a line break
new paragraph	a blank line (new paragraph)
tab key	a tab
press tab	a tab
tab	a tab

Markdown and code

Say	Writes
backtick	`
back quote	`
triple backtick	a code fence (three backticks) on a line of its own
code fence	a code fence (three backticks) on a line of its own
tilde	`~`
vertical bar	`
pipe symbol	`
caret	`^`
greater than sign	`>`
less than sign	`<`

Starting a line (say these first)

Say	Writes
bullet	`-`
list item	`-`
numbered item	`1.`
block quote	`>`
heading one	`#`
heading 1	`#`
heading two	`##`
heading 2	`##`
heading three	`###`
heading 3	`###`
heading four	`####`
heading 4	`####`
heading five	`#####`
heading 5	`#####`
heading six	`######`
heading 6	`######`

Commands: correcting

Say, on its own	What happens
“scratch that” or “delete that”	Removes the phrase you dictated last. Say it again to remove the one before. A phrase you have typed into since is left alone.
“undo that” or “undo” or “undo last”	The same as pressing Ctrl+Z.
“select that”	Selects the phrase you dictated last, so you can change or format it with the keyboard. The next phrase you say replaces it.
“capitalize that” or “cap that”	Gives every word of the last phrase a capital: meeting notes becomes Meeting Notes.
“all caps that” or “uppercase that”	Puts the last phrase in capitals.
“no caps that” or “lowercase that”	Puts the last phrase in small letters.
“delete word” or “delete last word”	Deletes the word just before the cursor.
“delete sentence” or “delete last sentence”	Deletes from the start of the sentence the cursor is in up to the cursor.
“delete previous paragraph” or “delete last paragraph”	Deletes the paragraph just before the cursor, from its start up to the cursor. In another program, only words dictation typed there.
“read that” or “repeat that”	Reads aloud again everything the last phrase, snippet, clip or review put in. In another program, only what dictation itself typed can be read.
“read last sentence” or “read the last sentence”	Reads the sentence just before the cursor, with its punctuation said.
“read last paragraph” or “read the last paragraph” or “read this paragraph”	Reads the paragraph the cursor is in.
“read selection” or “read the selection”	Reads what is selected.
“correct that”	Reads the other things the speech engine thought you said, numbered. Windows speech recognition offers its own; with Moonshine, Whisper or a downloaded model, the other built-in engine listens to the last phrase again and its answer is choice 2. Then say choose and a number.
“choose one” or “choose 1”	After correct that, puts the first of the other guesses in place of the last phrase.
“choose two” or “choose 2”	The same, with the second guess.
“choose three” or “choose 3”	The same, with the third guess.
“spell that”	Selects the phrase you dictated last and listens for it spelled out. Say the letters and they replace it. The fix for a name the engine keeps getting wrong.

Commands: moving the cursor

Say, on its own	What happens
“go to beginning of line” or “go to start of line”	Moves the cursor to the start of the line.
“go to end of line”	Moves the cursor to the end of the line.
“go to top” or “go to start of document” or “go to beginning of document”	Moves the cursor to the start of the document.
“go to bottom” or “go to end of document”	Moves the cursor to the end of the document.
“go to start of paragraph” or “go to beginning of paragraph”	Moves the cursor to the start of the paragraph.
“go to end of paragraph”	Moves the cursor to the end of the paragraph.

Commands: dictation itself

Say, on its own	What happens
“start spelling” or “spell mode” or “spelling mode”	Starts spelling mode: every phrase is read as letters until you say stop spelling. See Spelling below.
“stop spelling” or “end spelling” or “spelling off”	Leaves spelling mode.
“what can i say” or “show commands” or “dictation commands”	Opens this list.
“stop dictation” or “stop dictating” or “stop listening”	Stops dictation. With a wake phrase set, dictation goes back to waiting for it.
“switch to spanish” or “spanish dictation”	Dictate in Spanish from now on, the same as Switch Dictation Language. In Spanish, cambiar a inglés or dictado en inglés comes back.
“switch to english” or “english dictation”	Dictate in English from now on.

Commands: selecting

Say, on its own	What happens
“select sentence” or “select this sentence”	Selects the sentence the cursor is in.
“select line” or “select this line”	Selects the line the cursor is on.
“select paragraph” or “select this paragraph”	Selects the paragraph the cursor is in.
“select again” or “select next”	After select, go to or correct with words, moves on to the next place those words appear.
“select previous”	The same, going back to the place before.

Commands: capitals and spacing

Say, on its own	What happens
“caps on” or “capitals on”	Every word you say starts with a capital until you say caps off. Handy for titles and names.
“caps off” or “capitals off”	Words go back to ordinary capitals.
“all caps on”	Everything you say is written in capitals until you say all caps off.
“all caps off”	Back to ordinary capitals.
“no space on”	Words are written joined together with no spaces until you say no space off. Handy for web addresses and file names.
“no space off”	Spaces between words come back.

Commands: clips, snippets and copying

Say, on its own	What happens
“copy all” or “copy everything” or “copy document”	Copies the whole document, the same as Copy All on the Edit menu. Nothing is selected.
“copy that”	Copies the phrase you dictated last.
“show clips” or “open copy tray” or “show copy tray”	Opens the Copy Tray, where you choose a slot to paste.
“show snippets”	Opens the list of snippets to choose from.

Commands: profiles and formatting

Say, on its own	What happens
“bold that”	Makes the selection, or the phrase you dictated last, bold: QUILL’s own Bold in a document that holds formatting, two asterisks either side in the Markdown and Coding profiles.
“italic that” or “italicize that”	Makes the selection, or the phrase you dictated last, italic, the same way.
“standard mode” or “standard profile”	Switches to the Standard profile, unless Lock Profile is on.
“email mode” or “email profile”	Switches to the Email profile, unless Lock Profile is on.
“document mode” or “document profile”	Switches to the Document profile, unless Lock Profile is on.
“markdown mode” or “markdown profile”	Switches to the Markdown profile, unless Lock Profile is on.
“chat mode” or “chat profile”	Switches to the Chat profile, unless Lock Profile is on.
“coding mode” or “coding profile”	Switches to the Coding profile, unless Lock Profile is on.
“verbatim mode” or “verbatim profile”	Switches to the Verbatim profile, unless Lock Profile is on.

Commands with words after them: selecting

Say, at the start of a phrase	What happens
“select …” (words in your document)	Selects those words, looking first just before the cursor and then after it. Say select, the first words, through, and the last words to select everything between them. What you say next replaces the selection. If the words are not there, what you said is written as text instead.
“go to …” or “go before …” (words in your document)	Puts the cursor just before those words.
“go after …” (words in your document)	Puts the cursor just after those words.
“correct …” (words in your document)	Selects those words so that what you say next replaces them.

Commands with words after them: correcting

Say, at the start of a phrase	What happens
“replace …” (words in your document, then with, then the new words)	Replaces those words with the new ones: replace Tuesday with Wednesday. QUILL looks just before the cursor first, then after it; in another program, only in the phrase you dictated last. If the words are not there, what you said is written as text, as with select; after the command word, nothing is written.
“change that to …” (the new words)	Puts the new words in place of the phrase you dictated last: change that to see you on Friday. What it said before stays in Recent Phrases, marked before correction.
“spell …” (letters)	Spells one word without going into spelling mode: spell bravo alpha delta writes bad.

Commands with words after them: clips, snippets and copying

Say, at the start of a phrase	What happens
“paste clip …” or “paste slot …” (a number from one to twelve)	Pastes that slot of the Copy Tray.
“insert snippet …” (a snippet’s name)	Puts in the snippet with that name. If more than one matches, you hear how many and the snippet list opens.
“insert abbreviation …” or “expand abbreviation …” (an abbreviation)	Writes what that abbreviation expands to, as if you had typed it.

Commands with words after them: dictation itself

Say, at the start of a phrase	What happens
“dictation context …” (the name of a saved context)	Uses that saved context for this document, as if you had chosen it in Dictation Context for This Document.

Spelling

Say “start spelling”, then letters. Everything you say is written as letters until you say “stop spelling”.
Say “capital” before a letter for a capital, and “space” for a space. Say “all caps” for capitals until “no caps” or the end of the phrase.
Punctuation works while spelling, with no spaces, and each phrase joins the letters before it, so you can pause: “jay dot sierra mike india tango hotel”, then “at sign echo x-ray dot charlie oscar” writes j.smith@ex.co. “Dot” is a full stop only here. A whole word that is not a letter is left out.
Say “spell” and the letters to spell one word without starting spelling mode, and “spell that” to spell the last phrase over again.
Letter names work (“bee”, “see”), and the phonetic alphabet is clearer: alpha, bravo, charlie, delta, echo, foxtrot, golf, hotel, india, juliet, kilo, lima, mike, november, oscar, papa, quebec, romeo, sierra, tango, uniform, victor, whiskey, x-ray, yankee, zulu.
Numbers are written as digits: zero, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.

Worked examples

Each of these works the same in QUILL and QUILL Lite. What you get is what the automated acceptance tests check.

You have	You say	You get
Meet me on Friday.	“go to Friday”, then “next”	Meet me on next Friday. The cursor goes in front of the words, and what you say next is written there.
Meet me on Friday.	“go after meet me”, then “at noon”	Meet me at noon on Friday.
The cat sat. The cat ran. The cat slept. (cursor at the end)	“select the cat”, then “select previous” twice, then “select again”	The third The cat is selected first, because the nearest match before the cursor wins; then the second, then the first; then the second again. At the ends you hear “None before that.” or “No more.”
Dear Sam, the meeting moved to Tuesday at ten.	“select the meeting through Tuesday”	the meeting moved to Tuesday is selected. The next phrase you say replaces it.
I met Ann today.	“correct Ann”, then “Anne”	I met Anne today.
Any document	“copy all”	The whole document is on the clipboard. Nothing is selected and the cursor does not move, so the next word you say cannot replace everything.
Kept. (typed by you)	“first phrase period”, “second phrase period”, then “scratch that” twice	Kept. Each scratch that takes out one dictated phrase, newest first. Your own typing is never taken; a phrase you have typed into since is left alone.
Copy Tray slots 1 to 12 filled	“paste clip one” up to “paste clip twelve”, or “paste slot 12”	That slot’s text goes in as one phrase, so scratch that takes all of it back. An empty slot is said (“Slot 4 is empty.”); “paste clip thirteen” asks for a slot number.
A snippet named sign off	“insert snippet sign off”	The snippet’s text. A name said as separate words finds a joined name too (“sig off” finds sigoff). When two names match, you hear how many and nothing is typed.
An abbreviation named home address	“insert abbreviation home address”	What the abbreviation expands to.
Anywhere	“caps on”, “the old man and the sea”, “caps off”	The Old Man And The Sea. All caps on and all caps off work the same way for capitals throughout. Every mode ends when dictation stops.
meeting notes (just dictated)	“capitalize that”, then “all caps that”, then “no caps that”	Meeting Notes, then MEETING NOTES, then meeting notes.
Write to	“start spelling”, “jay dot sierra mike india tango hotel”, “at sign echo x-ray dot charlie oscar”, “stop spelling”	Write to `j.smith@ex.co`. While spelling, each phrase joins the letters before it with no space, so you can pause as often as you like; say “space” for a space. A whole word such as smith is not a letter and is left out.
An empty line	“heading one shopping”, “bullet milk”, “numbered item call the bank”, “block quote be kind”	`# Shopping`, then `- Milk`, `1. Call the bank` and `> Be kind`, each on its own line.
See	“open bracket the guide close bracket”, then “open paren page close paren”	`See [the guide](page)`: a Markdown link, with no space between the bracket and the parenthesis.

Limits

How accurately and how quickly each engine hears you has not been measured yet. Those numbers wait on the dictation benchmarks; nothing in this guide is a claim about them.
Commands that take words after them (select, go to, go after, correct, paste clip, insert snippet) work only at the start of a phrase.
Words you ask for are looked for in the document’s text. When they are not there, what you said is written as words and you hear “Not found, written as text.” Scratch that takes it out.
An asterisk and an underscore join the words either side of them (two*three, snake_case). For Markdown bold, use “bold that” with the Markdown profile.
In another program (QUILL Transcribe, and Quill Inkwell’s Dictate Anywhere) dictation can only type: dictating, punctuation, scratch that, the modes, spelling, paste clip, insert snippet and insert abbreviation work. Anything that has to read or select that program’s text is refused with the same sentence: select, go to, go after, select again, select sentence, line or paragraph, copy all, copy that, show clips, show snippets, spell that, and read last sentence or read selection.
In another program, a snippet or abbreviation that puts the cursor in the middle leaves it at the end instead, because moving it back would mean reading that program’s text.

Starting and stopping by voice

With the wake phrase switched on in Dictation Settings, say “Quill dictate” to start dictation without touching the keyboard. Anything you say after it in the same breath is written.
Say “stop dictation” on its own, after a pause, to stop dictation. “Stop dictation” always works too. With the wake phrase on, stopping goes back to waiting for the wake phrase.
You choose both phrases in Dictation Settings; each needs at least two words.

Spanish punctuation

With the dictation language set to Spanish, these words write punctuation only while automatic punctuation is off (or with Windows speech recognition): coma and punto are everyday words too. Commands are the English ones above.

Say	Writes
“punto” or “punto y seguido” or “punto final”	.
“punto y aparte”	. and a new paragraph
“coma”	,
“punto y coma”	;
“dos puntos”	:
“puntos suspensivos”	…
“abrir interrogación” or “abre interrogación” or “signo de interrogación abierto” or “abrir signo de interrogación”	¿
“cerrar interrogación” or “cierra interrogación” or “signo de interrogación cerrado” or “cerrar signo de interrogación” or “signo de interrogación”	?
“abrir exclamación” or “abre exclamación” or “signo de exclamación abierto” or “abrir signo de exclamación”	¡
“cerrar exclamación” or “cierra exclamación” or “signo de exclamación cerrado” or “cerrar signo de exclamación” or “signo de exclamación”	!
“abrir paréntesis” or “abre paréntesis”	(
“cerrar paréntesis” or “cierra paréntesis”	)
“abrir comillas” or “abre comillas”	the quotation mark “
“cerrar comillas” or “cierra comillas”	the quotation mark “
“guion” or “guión”	-
“guion largo” or “guión largo”	a dash, in the style chosen for dash
“arroba”	@
“nueva línea” or “nuevo renglón”	a line break
“nuevo párrafo”	a blank line (new paragraph)
“tabulador”	a tab