Babble

A macOS voice input tool that uses MLX Whisper for local speech-to-text transcription and Apple Foundation Models for on-device text refinement.

Requirements

• macOS 26+ (Tahoe)
• Apple Silicon Mac

Installation

From GitHub Releases

1. Download Babble-vX.X.X.zip from Releases

2. Unzip and move Babble.app to /Applications

3. First Launch Security:

   Since the app is not notarized, macOS will block it on first launch:

   • Double-click Babble.app - you'll see a warning dialog
   • Open System Settings > Privacy & Security
   • Scroll down to Security section
   • Click "Open Anyway" next to the Babble message
   • Click "Open" in the confirmation dialog

4. Grant permissions when prompted:

   • Microphone: Required for voice recording
   • Accessibility: Required for pasting text (Cmd+V simulation)

Troubleshooting Permissions

If accessibility permissions show the wrong app path:

# Reset accessibility permissions for Babble
tccutil reset Accessibility com.babble.app

# Reset microphone permissions for Babble
tccutil reset Microphone com.babble.app

Then relaunch the app and grant permissions again.

Usage

1. Press Option+Space to start/stop recording (or hold for push-to-talk)
2. Speak into your microphone
3. Text will be transcribed and pasted into the active application

Building from Source

Swift App

cd BabbleApp
swift build -c release
./build-app.sh

Whisper Service

The whisper-service is downloaded automatically on first launch. For development:

cd whisper-service
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
python server.py

License

MIT