Hold a key.
Say the thing.
Budgie is a tiny bird that lives in your menu bar. Hold right ⌘, talk, and your words appear wherever your cursor is — typed live, while you speak. Release the key and you're done.
Small bird. Strong opinions.
Nothing you say ever leaves your Mac.
Budgie runs open speech models (NVIDIA Parakeet, via parakeet.cpp) entirely on your machine. No cloud, no account, no audio uploads, no telemetry. Pull the Wi-Fi cable out — it keeps working.
Fast as a flap
The engine stays warm in memory, so dictation starts the instant you press the key — and words stream out as you speak.
Push-to-talk, not push-your-luck
Hold right ⌘ to record, release to finish. A quick tap keeps the key's normal behaviour — Budgie only listens while you hold.
A bird, not a behemoth
A native Swift menu-bar app. No Electron, no browser in a trench coat. It perches quietly until you need it.
Open source, naturally
Every line is on GitHub. Build it yourself, fork it, teach it new tricks.
git clone github.com/mkh09353/budgie
Two dictation styles
Live types words as you say them. Punctuated waits a beat, then delivers polished text with punctuation.
Your words, your way
Type straight at the cursor in any app, or send the transcript to your clipboard instead. Your choice.
Three seconds to learn. Honestly.
Hold
Press and hold right ⌘ (or pick another key). The bird turns into little red level bars.
Speak
Say the email, the commit message, the grocery list. Words appear at your cursor as you talk.
Release
Let go. Done. Budgie even tracks how much typing time you've saved (it adds up fast).