Built-in voice dictation arrives in VSCode 1.131.0 🎙️
VSCode some time ago changed how quickly they release new features, I believe they do weekly releases now. It is really hard to keep track, but this certainly caught my eye.
Built-in voice dictation arrives in VSCode 🎙️
Microsoft has quietly added a feature that many developers have been waiting for: native voice dictation in VSCode.
Previously, if you wanted speech-to-text capabilities in VSCode, you needed to install the VSCode Speech extension. Now, dictation is built directly! 😊
The only problem for me so far is, that I mostly use VSCode inside RDP to a VM, and the built-in dictation does not work there because the microphone is not accessible from within the RDP session.
Could not access the microphone for speech-to-text: Requested device not found is displayed instead.
Works fine on my laptop though 🤣
Apparently, people do not even want to type their code (which is literally just vibe coded prompt to AI anyway), so they will absolutely love this feature 🤣
Dictation everywhere
The new built-in dictation experience works across:
- Chat inputs
- Text editors
- The integrated terminal
One of the smartest aspects of the implementation is that VSCode shares a single speech session and microphone selection across all three surfaces.
Privacy-First transcription
Perhaps the most interesting detail is Microsoft’s approach to privacy.
Built-in dictation uses the Nemotron transcription model, which runs locally on your machine. The model is downloaded the first time you use dictation and operates offline.
The dictation.enabled setting controls the feature and can be managed by an organization.
That means:
- No separate speech extension required
- Audio remains on your device
- Offline transcription support
- Lower privacy concerns when working with sensitive code
Optional AI cleanup
For users who want a more polished dictation experience, VSCode includes an experimental setting:
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When enabled, Copilot can improve the transcript as you speak by:
- Removing filler words
- Improving punctuation
- Adding formatting
- Cleaning up sentence structure
The result should be much closer to something you would actually type yourself.
Control the live transcript
If you are using VSCode Insiders, there is another useful setting available:
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This allows you to control whether the live transcript is displayed while you are dictating.