Microsoft Word Dictate Review and Tutorial

Do you ever come across a situation where you have to type in a lot of text?

For example, a long document in word or a long email, or maybe you are writing your own blogs and stuff for your website?

Well, in that case, it can be handy to use something else than just typing. I don’t know about your typing skills, but mine are not that excellent. So, when writing my e-books, I discovered something else. And that’s what I want to talk to you about today.

My name is Olaf and I am your ToolFinderr. So, stay tuned!

00:37 Why did I need Microsoft Word Dictate?

Why did I need this? As said, I was writing the accompanying e-book and my typing became somewhat frustrating. You have to redo a lot of stuff, you have the typos, you have to re-read it, you have to do the punctuation… And also I switch a lot between different languages.

So, I thought okay there must be an easier way, a more productive way to do my typing. And if you have to type a lot of short text, then it might not be useful. But especially for longer text and when you want to be more creative, I would recommend using Microsoft dictate instead of typing.

And I actually discovered this I think Microsoft itself sent out an email about it, and you know I thought to myself let’s just try this and see how it works. And it works actually great in Outlook in Word and in PowerPoint as well. So, it saves me a lot of time.

I thought it makes sense because I already use a lot of dictation in WhatsApp and Google Voice search and even text. Sometimes I use another Chrome Extension for Dutch language texts because that is not available yet in Microsoft dictate. But this is why I needed this, and I thought okay let’s try its speed and accuracy.

02:06 Benefits of Microsoft Word Dictate

Now, what are the benefits of this tool? Well, as mentioned, speed is one of the most important ones.

I can type pretty fast, but if it’s a longer text you will be much, much faster dictating. With Microsoft dictate, it will also have a real-time recognition and error correction, so even small errors won’t be in your final text.

It’s really easy, there’s no installation, and it’s free.

What I have discovered is that when just talking, you can be more creative. You are free of mind so to speak, so it’s easier for example for blogging to create better texts altogether. 

And last but not least there are 29 plus languages that you can use it for.

02:56 Use cases Microsoft Word Dictate

So, what are the use cases for this Microsoft dictate? Well, as mentioned especially for longer text this is a really easy tool it’s built-in, so you don’t have to install anything for it and just go ahead and use it. 

For Word documents, for blogs and emails it’s very easy. 

Especially when they’re a little bit longer, I use them all the time. I can actually recommend it wholeheartedly.

I’m not sure if you are a physician, but if you are, and this is just an example obviously, the average US physician could reduce documentation time by about seven hours per week by switching from typing to dictation. 

Well, obviously I think you and me are not the kinds of guys and girls that are typing all the time, but still, you type more than you think.

03:46 Dictating versus typing        

So, what about the differences between dictating and typing? 

Well, some statistics: as you can see about the speed, the average rate for transcription is 33 words per minute and 19 words for composition. A professional typist types in 50 to 80 words per minute.

And using speech recognition, what we are talking about here, you can easily achieve over 100 words per minute with more than 95 percent accuracy, which is actually a great improvement. 

So, what are the benefits:

• it’s faster
• it’s easier, also on your muscles
• no RSI (Repetitive Strain Injury)
• no keyboard or mouse use, so that actually helps a lot in my case as well

And you can walk around, you can do the dictation freely. You can do whatever you want and still have a good conversation with your computer. 

And what comes out is more like a conversation than it is actually the typing of information:

• it gets more rounded
• it’s freer
• its more creative
• it’s just better

05:04 Microsoft Word Dictate demo

So, as usual, the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

Let’s go to Word in this case. I’ll start with a blank document. And as you can see, it’s already built-in here at the top. I will set it to English to show you how this works, so let’s start a blank document and let’s start dictating.

Hello, guys, comma new line new line this is an example of how you can use Microsoft Dictate in a Word document period. New line new line as you can see, it autocorrects comma it is fast, and the accuracy is a brilliant exclamation mark. new line new line I can that’s an error, I can recommend it to you wholeheartedly period. new line new line greetings comma new line Olaf.

So, I thought this is pretty impressive, right? 

I mean I  don’t know I did not see any errors let’s go back one more time to see. 

Hello guys, this is an example. Yes, zero errors apart from my hiccup.

But apart from that, it is very easy to use it is brilliant in its accuracy and speed.

So, I can recommend it to you. 

I would say use it in all of your office applications, and you will be very happy. 

Okay, see you in the next video, bye.

Good luck 
Olaf the ToolFinderr