Willow

Willow is another AI-powered voice dictation app that launched on the Mac a while back and, earlier this week, came out on iOS. (The developers have been kind enough to offer Club MacStories members 200 codes for a one-month free trial; you can find the details in this issue of the newsletter). I’ve been monitoring this new category of apps very closely over the past year, and I’ve tried a bunch of apps in this space: Willow, Superwhisper, Wispr Flow, Raycast, and Aqua come to mind. Something that has become clear to me is that if a dictation app for Mac doesn’t offer an iOS counterpart, I’m not going to use it much. And for those apps that do offer an iOS version, it seems that the general consensus is to build a custom keyboard that kicks you off to the main app temporarily to start dictation, then keeps the session active as a Live Activity so you can dictate in any other app on your iPhone using a custom keyboard.

The new Willow app for iOS checks all these boxes and then some. The iOS app syncs with Willow for Mac, including your custom dictionaries of specific terms that you often dictate and want the app to remember. Something that I appreciate about Willow on both platforms is that the app uses a Live Activity on iOS and a custom “Dynamic Island” UI in the MacBook’s notch to show you that it’s listening and transcribing. I find that to be a nice touch.

In my tests, Willow’s engine (unfortunately, the developers don’t advertise which AI model they’re using) is up there with Wispr Flow in terms of speed and accuracy, although Wispr Flow performed better with commas and overall punctuation for me. Regardless, the iOS version is very polished, and its transcription engine is leagues beyond Apple’s default dictation feature. I highly recommend taking advantage of the promo codes to test the app for a month while they’re available.

SuperWidget

SuperWidget is a utility that lets you build custom widgets using data from Apple’s Shortcuts app or third-party APIs. What makes SuperWidget particularly interesting is how it bridges the gap between Shortcuts automation and data sources from external APIs; you could, for instance, create a widget that displays your website’s visitor count, your smart home’s current temperature, or any other data accessible through a REST API. I’ve always wished that Apple would allow me to design custom widgets powered by Shortcuts data, and this is an interesting third-party take on the idea that reminds me of designing a custom dashboard for the TRMNL as well as Panic’s old Status Board app.