Speech recognition guesses from a general vocabulary. Your colleague's surname, your company's product names and the abbreviations your industry uses are not in it — which is why the same word comes out wrong every single time.
The dictionary fixes that once. Add the term, and it is handed to the recogniser before your next dictation.
When to use the dictionary instead of repeating yourself
Reach for it as soon as you have corrected the same word twice. Typical entries:
- Names — colleagues, clients, doctors, case parties
- Company and product names — "TechStart Inc", "Bayer AG"
- Industry jargon — medical, legal and technical terms
- Abbreviations you say out loud
- Spellings you prefer — "Kubernetes" rather than "kubernetes"
It is not the place for a phrase you want to type out in full — that is a snippet.
Add a word
- Open Sprecho and click Dictionary in the sidebar.
- Click Add new.
- Type the term under Add a new word exactly as it should appear — capitalisation included.
- Click Add word.
That is enough for most cases. The recogniser now knows the term exists.
Correcting a specific misspelling
If the recogniser reliably produces one particular wrong version, turn the entry into a replacement rule instead:
- In the same dialog, switch on Correct a misspelling.
- Fill in Misspelling (what comes out) and Correct spelling (what you want).
- Save.
From then on the wrong version is replaced automatically whenever it is dictated. Use this for "schmitt" → "Schmidt", "mueller" → "Müller", "sara" → "Sarah".
Let Sprecho learn from your corrections
You do not have to add every word by hand. When you edit a dictation in your history, Sprecho compares the before and after.
- Clear corrections are learned straight away. A short "Learned:" note appears with an Undo button.
- Less certain ones land in Suggestions, the inbox at the top of the Dictionary page. Each one shows how often it has been seen. Accept adds it, Reject stops it being suggested again, and Edit before accepting lets you fix the spelling first. There are Accept all and Reject all buttons for a backlog.
Words that are common in any supported language are never learned automatically — that is what keeps everyday vocabulary out of your dictionary.
Pin the entries that matter most
The recogniser can only be primed with a limited number of terms per dictation. Once your dictionary grows past that, not everything fits.
The Pin to recognizer action on a dictionary row reserves a slot for that entry, so it always reaches the recogniser regardless of how long your list has become. Pin the handful of names you genuinely cannot afford to have wrong — your own, your biggest client's, the drug or statute you cite daily.
Pinning everything is the same as pinning nothing. The budget is fixed, so each extra pin dilutes the ones already there. Keep the pinned list short and let the rest of your dictionary work normally.
Team and built-in entries
The tabs at the top split your dictionary into All, Personal and Shared with team.
Turning on Share with team in the add dialog puts an entry into the shared list, so nobody else has to add the same company term again. Sharing requires a team — see Shared team dictionary and snippets.
Some entries are marked Built-in — always recognized. Those ship with Sprecho and cannot be deleted.
Every row also shows how often the term has been used, which is a quick way to spot entries you added once and never needed again.