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LokalBot vs MacWhisper

MacWhisper is the go-to Mac app for transcribing files: drag in an interview, lecture, or podcast and get text back, on-device. It also records calls without a bot and offers dictation. LokalBot overlaps on meetings and dictation but is built around recall rather than files — meeting notes with local summaries, a searchable library, and a day timeline. LokalBot is free and open source; MacWhisper has a free version and a one-time Pro license.

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Side by side

Feature by feature.

Feature LokalBot MacWhisper
Transcribe existing files Import audio and video recordings as meetings; no subtitle export Drag and drop audio or video; export subtitles and documents
Meeting capture Auto-detected, bot-free microphone + system-audio tracks, summarized locally Records Zoom, Teams, Webex, Skype, and Discord calls without a bot
Where transcription runs On your computer — Qwen3-ASR by default, with Parakeet and Whisper as alternatives, plus Granite Speech on Mac On your Mac, with a choice of local models
AI summaries llama.cpp built in; Ollama or OpenAI-compatible servers only if you approve them Connects to OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, xAI, Ollama, and other providers
Dictation Hold ⌥ Space (Alt+Space on Windows and Linux) in any app Real-time dictation in any app
Transcription languages On Mac: 52 languages and dialects with the default model; 99 with Whisper 100+
Day timeline App and window activity by default; screen text and encrypted screenshots are opt-in and deleted after 14 days No
Writing autocomplete Cotyping, in almost any app (on Linux: X11, or Wayland on Sway, Hyprland, and GNOME) No
Source code Open source, GPLv3 Proprietary
Price Free Free version · Pro €64 one-time, with lifetime updates
Platforms macOS 15+ on Apple Silicon; Windows 10/11 x64 and Linux x86_64 in alpha macOS, plus a separate iOS app

Verdict

Which one fits you?

Pick MacWhisper if…

The specialist for turning recordings into text.

  • You transcribe interviews, lectures, podcasts, or voice memos you already have
  • You need subtitle files or batch transcription
  • You like paying once for a polished single-purpose tool
  • You want summaries from your own cloud AI keys

Pick LokalBot if…

For meetings and memory, not just transcripts.

  • You want meeting notes with summaries and follow-ups, not only raw text
  • You want to search across meetings and what was on your screen
  • Free and open source matters to you
  • You want summaries from a local model with no keys to manage

Questions

The short answers.

Can LokalBot transcribe an existing audio file?

Not today. LokalBot transcribes the meetings and dictation it records. For files you already have, MacWhisper is the better tool — and the two apps run fine side by side.

Which one is more private?

Both can transcribe entirely on your Mac. The difference is in what surrounds it: LokalBot's summaries run on a built-in local model by default, and its source code is public under GPLv3, so you can check what it does with your audio.

Do they use the same speech models?

Partly. Both can run Whisper-family models on your Mac. LokalBot defaults to Qwen3-ASR and also offers Parakeet and Granite Speech; the benchmarks page compares several of them on the same test set.

Download

Meetings, dictation, and recall — on your Mac.

Free and open source. Models download on first use; built-in inference then works offline.

Download for macOS

Apple Silicon · macOS 15+ · brew install --cask stevyhacker/tap/lokalbot

macOS · Windows · Linux (alpha) · requirements · all releases and notes

MacWhisper is a trademark of its owner; LokalBot is not affiliated with or endorsed by it. Details are based on public pages and pricing as of October 2026 and may change — if something here is wrong or out of date, open an issue and we'll fix it.