What are the pros and cons of Dragon voice-to-text software?

No typing! What’s not to like? Have used it for years.

Tried it years back. It kept insisting I was saying captain when the first time I said “it” and the five times after the I said “delete”. Then I asked it “parrot?” and it responded “it”, then I closed it.

It can get wonky with recognizing words. At the start of things it can be rather frustrating. The key is to stick with it and correct things as they need to be corrected. The program learns and adapts.

It says you need a good microphone. That will help, but you really don’t.

The main thing though is really to decide you want to use and and force it to work. I had plenty of instances where it would put in the word or otherwise misunderstand me. But once you get the hang of it, and it the hang of you, things go a lot more smoothly.

I have been using Dragon NaturallySpeaking Version 9, exclusively, due to disability. I would much prefer to use my hands and fingers but because that is no longer possible Dragon is my only means of using a computer. I do not get the impression from your question that you have a similar issue, but rather that you have some other reason for considering this option. From my experience, Dragon is a wonderful tool that has allowed me to open the window of my life considerably wider than it had been for too long. It has taken me quite some time to use it smoothly but there are still often hiccups along the way, I think it is simply par for the course. I have a love/hate relationship with The Dragon but I would not be without it now. If you have any specific question please ask away.

It takes a while to train it, and you’re always going to run into problems with it, especially if you have a thick accent. It’s also somewhere around 10–12 GBs on your hard drive, no clue why. But once it’s trained, and provided you don’t try to perform open-toe surgery with it or something, it’s pretty good software.

Here’s a very recent NY Times article about Dragon