Kana as a Dragon alternative
The software most people mean when they say dictation software. Dragon Professional is still sold for Windows. Dragon Dictate for Mac was discontinued in 2018 and never replaced, and Dragon Anywhere for mobile shut down on 1 July 2026.
What Dragon does better
On Windows, Dragon is still ahead of everything on this site at the things it was built for: spoken correction, voice commands that drive the whole machine, recorded macros, and professional vocabularies for law and medicine built over decades. Kana has none of that, and Kana has no Windows version. If your work runs on a Dragon macro set, nothing here replaces it.
Where Kana is different
- Kana is a current Mac app on Apple Silicon, against a Mac product that stopped shipping in 2018.
- Transcription runs on device, and the whole app is $9.99 once.
- Setup is choosing a hotkey. There is no voice profile to train first.
Side by side
| Kana | Dragon | |
|---|---|---|
| Available for Mac | Yes | No, discontinued in 2018 |
| Voice commands and macros | No | Yes, on Windows |
| Specialist vocabularies | No | Yes |
| Price | $9.99 once | About $700 on Windows |
Dragon pricing: Windows only, around $700 once. The Mac version was discontinued in 2018.