The Sprecho keyboard is installed, but tapping the microphone does nothing — or there is no microphone button at all, or your usual keyboard keeps appearing. Almost every case is one of four things: the keyboard is enabled but not selected, a permission is missing, you are signed out, or your phone stopped Sprecho in the background.
Try this first
- Open the Sprecho app and make sure you are signed in. The keyboard cannot dictate for a signed-out account, and it says so on its own surface.
- iOS: go to Settings → General → Keyboard → Keyboards, tap Sprecho, and turn on Allow Full Access.
- Android: open the Sprecho app, go to Menu → Input Method, and check that both Keyboard Enabled and Keyboard Selected are green. Each row takes you to the right system screen.
- Switch to the Sprecho keyboard: tap and hold the globe key and choose Sprecho.
Enabling the keyboard is not the same as using it
This is the most common misunderstanding on both platforms. Adding Sprecho to the system keyboard list makes it available; your phone keeps using whichever keyboard was active before until you switch.
Tap and hold the globe key and pick Sprecho. On iOS the ABC key on the Sprecho keyboard takes you back, so you can move between them freely.
iOS: Sprecho is not in "Add New Keyboard…"
Right after installing, iOS sometimes does not list Sprecho yet. Close Settings completely — swipe it away from the app switcher — and open it again. No app can force iOS to re-scan, so this is the whole workaround. The path is Settings → General → Keyboard → Keyboards → Add New Keyboard….
iOS: "Full Access is required for Sprecho to work"
Full Access is not optional here. It is what lets the keyboard extension read your sign-in from the Sprecho app and receive your finished text back. Without it you get a plain letter keyboard and no microphone — which is exactly the "there is no mic button" report.
Turn it on under Settings → General → Keyboard → Keyboards → Sprecho → Allow Full Access. The keyboard picks the change up within about a second while it is on screen; no restart needed. After a delete-and-reinstall, iOS can report the keyboard as enabled while Full Access is off — toggling it off and on clears that.
The microphone permission lives in the app, not the keyboard
Neither keyboard can ask for microphone access itself — that has to happen in the Sprecho app.
- Android: open the Sprecho app and allow the microphone when it asks. If you refused earlier, the keyboard shows Microphone access denied when you tap the mic.
- iOS: the microphone belongs to the Sprecho app, which is why the keyboard shows a Start Sprecho button the first time. If access was refused, go to Settings → Sprecho and turn the microphone on.
Android: your phone stopped Sprecho in the background
If Sprecho worked and then quietly stopped — particularly on Samsung, Xiaomi, Huawei, Honor or OnePlus — the phone's battery management shut the background service down while its switch still shows as on. Sprecho detects this and offers a Fix Sprecho service card on its home screen.
The manual repair, and the only one that works: open Settings → Accessibility → Sprecho, switch it off, then on again.
To stop it recurring:
- Exclude Sprecho from battery optimisation.
- On Samsung, also set Allow background activity → Always.
- On Xiaomi, also enable Autostart for Sprecho.
- On Huawei and Honor, disable battery optimisation for Sprecho.
- Leave the silent "Sprecho — Ready to dictate" notification in place. It is what keeps the service alive; hiding it invites the phone to kill Sprecho again.
Nothing happens on the mic button, with beeping
Repeated error beeps with no dictation mean your session expired — this typically appeared about a month after signing in. Open the Sprecho app and sign in again. Updating to the current version prevents it from coming back; I keep getting signed out has the background.
Two other quiet stops: a weekly limit reached on the free plan, and dictating on another device at the same time — one recording per account.
Symptom → cause
| What you see | What it usually is |
|---|---|
| Your normal keyboard keeps appearing | Sprecho is enabled but not selected — hold the globe key |
| Letters but no microphone button (iOS) | Full Access is off |
| Sprecho missing from "Add New Keyboard…" | iOS has not re-scanned — close Settings fully and reopen |
| "Microphone access denied" | The microphone was never granted in the Sprecho app |
| Worked for weeks, then stopped (Android) | Battery management stopped the background service — toggle it off and on |
| Error beeps, no text | Session expired — sign in again in the app |
| Keyboard vanishes mid-dictation (iOS) | iOS reclaimed memory; tap the globe key to bring Sprecho back |
| Text appears only after switching apps | A known iOS timing issue — update the app |
Still stuck?
Contact support with your phone model, your OS version and your Sprecho version from Menu → About. On Android, say whether the accessibility switch shows as on — that one detail separates two very different problems.