Here is a visual guide listing many of the most popular dictation commands to use with Siri. Ideal if you want to try text dictation on your iPhone for sending messages, emails, or making notes.
If you’ve used any sort of voice recognition software before, a lot of these commands will be familiar.
In this article, we trigger Siri using the “Hey Siri” voice command. Did you know there are other methods available, depending on your device? You can read about them all in our how to use Siri guide.
Make sure Dictation is turned on by opening the Settings app and tap Keyboard > Enable Dictation. The switch should be toggled to the on position.
You can then trigger dictation by using the “Hey Siri” voice command, or by tapping the microphone icon at the bottom right of your device’s keyboard.
Siri Dictation Commands
Below is a comprehensive list of dictation commands. Use the search field to filter by keyword.
| Command | Action | Before | After |
|---|---|---|---|
| New line | Move to the next line | ||
| New paragraph | Start a new paragraph | ||
| Cap | Capitalise the next word | I like 'cap' sunshine | I like Sunshine |
| Caps on ... caps off | Capitalise a section of text | 'caps on' twenty types of flower 'caps off' | 20 Types of Flower |
| All caps | Make the next word all uppercase | I 'all caps' love summer | I LOVE summer |
| All caps on ... all caps off | Make part of what you say uppercase | I 'all caps on' love summer 'all caps off' | I LOVE SUMMER |
| No caps | Make the next word lowercase | I like 'no caps' Capitals | I like capitals |
| No caps on ... no caps off | Make sure part of what you say is all lowercase | We like the cities 'no caps' London and Sydney 'no caps off' the most | We like the cities london and sydney the most |
| Space bar | Prevent a hyphen from appearing in a normally hyphenated word | ||
| No space | Prevent a space between words | ||
| No space on ... no space off | Prevent a section of text from having spaces between words | ||
| "Period" or "full stop" | Place a "." at the end of a sentence | ||
| Dot | . | The number pi is three 'dot' one four | The number pi is 3.14 |
| Point | . | The 'point' number pi is three 'point' one four | The point number pi 3.14 (note the subtle difference between saying 'point' and 'dot' dot works between words) |
| "Ellipsis" or "dot dot dot" | ... | ||
| Comma | , | ||
| Double comma | ,, | ||
| "Quote" or "quotation mark" | " | ||
| "Quote ... end quote" or "quote ... close quote" | Place quotes around a section of text | She said 'quote' see you next week 'end quote' | She said "see you next week" |
| Apostrophe | ' | ||
| Exclamation point | ! | ||
| Inverted exclamation point | ¡ | ||
| Question mark | ? | ||
| Inverted question mark | ¿ | ||
| Ampersand | & | ||
| Asterisk | * | ||
| Open parenthesis or 'left paren'* | ( | ||
| Close parenthesis or 'right paren'* | ) | ||
| Open bracket | [ | ||
| Close bracket | ] | ||
| Open brace | { | ||
| Close brace | } | ||
| Dash | - | This dash is dash my dash cheese | This - is - my - cheese (note the difference in spacing between this and when saying hyphen) |
| Hyphen | - | This 'hyphen' is 'hyphen' my 'hyphen' cheese | This-is-my-cheese (note the difference in spacing between this and when saying dash) |
| Em dash | — | ||
| Underscore | _ | ||
| Percent sign | % | ||
| Copyright sign | © | ||
| Registered sign | ® | ||
| Section sign | § | ||
| Dollar sign | $ | ||
| Cent sign | ¢ | ||
| Euro sign | € | ||
| Yen sign | ¥ | ||
| Degree sign | ∘ | ||
| Caret | ^ | ||
| At sign | @ | ||
| Pound sterling sign | £ | ||
| Pound sign | # | ||
| Greater than sign | > | ||
| Less than sign | |||
| Forward slash | / | ||
| Back slash | \ | ||
| Vertical bar | | | ||
| "Smiley" or "smiley face" or "smile face" | 🙂 | ||
| "Frowny" or "frowny face" or "frown face" | 🙁 | ||
| "Winky" or "winky face" or "wink face" | 😉 | ||
| E.g. (pronounced as "e g") | e.g. | 'e g' when you learn to ride a bike | E.G. when you learn to ride a bike |
| i.e. (pronounced as "i e") | i.e. | 'i e' when you learn to ride a bike | I.e. when you learn to ride a bike |