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A voice shortcut runs an action instead of pasting text. Hold your dictation shortcut, say a trigger phrase and what you want, and Vowen opens a search, a website, an app or a folder, or calls a webhook or script. Click Voice shortcuts in the sidebar. The banner reads Hold and say the word., where the hotkey is your dictation shortcut. Voice shortcuts page with custom voice shortcuts above the built-in ones The built-in voice shortcuts work on every plan. The Free plan holds 3 custom voice shortcuts. Pro removes the limit and adds the Webhook and Scripts actions.

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Built-in voice shortcuts

Eight are turned on by default. Say the trigger, then your query, with nothing in between: “google best pizza near me”, not “search Google for best pizza near me”. You can turn each one off on the Voice shortcuts page. Search queries get your Dictionary misspelling fixes before the search runs.
Recognizes Documents, Downloads, Desktop, Pictures, Music, Movies (Videos on Windows) and Home, plus Applications on macOS. Singular and plural both work, and a trailing word is ignored, so “open downloads folder” works.If nothing matches, Vowen pastes the text as normal dictation.

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How triggers are matched

Vowen compares what you said with every enabled trigger in three passes:
  1. Exact start. The transcript starts with the trigger.
  2. Fillers and variants. Leading words such as “can you”, “could you”, “please”, “hey”, “okay”, “ok”, “um”, “uh”, “so”, “well” and “like” are removed, then Vowen compares again. Built-ins also know common mishearings, so “ask clawed”, “ask chat gbt”, “hey google” and “you tube” still work.
  3. Close match. The start of the transcript is at least 75% similar to the trigger or one of its variants.
Longer triggers are checked first. On a tie, your custom voice shortcuts win over built-ins. Everything after the trigger becomes the query.

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How to create a voice shortcut

1

Click Create Voice Shortcut

The button is in the toolbar of the Voice shortcuts page.
2

Enter the trigger

Type the phrase you will say.
3

Add actions

Pick an action from the chips under Action. A voice shortcut can combine several actions.
4

Save

The summary at the bottom (This voice shortcut will:) lists what it does.
Create Voice Shortcut dialog with a Trigger field, a Websites action, an Open in browser menu and chips for Applications, Folders, Webhook and Scripts

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Actions

There is no separate “search” action. The built-in searches are Websites actions with a search URL, and you can build your own the same way. Use {{text}} in a website URL, a webhook URL, header or body, or a script, and Vowen inserts what you said after the trigger. For example, the trigger search amazon with the URL amazon.com/s?k={{text}} turns “search amazon noise cancelling headphones” into an Amazon results page. URLs without a scheme get https://.

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Choose a browser and profile

Each voice shortcut has an Open in menu for its websites. Default browser uses your system default. Pick a browser to open that one instead. When the browser supports profiles, a Profile menu lists the profiles it has. Safari has no profile option. Finding browsers and profiles never triggers a permission prompt. If the browser or profile is gone, or opening it fails, the page opens in your default browser instead. A browser that is no longer installed shows Not installed — your default browser will be used. On Windows, other browsers can be found through the Start menu, but without profile support.

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Open apps

The Applications action lists the apps installed on your computer. Turn on Open with a specific folder to give each app a folder to open, for example your editor on a project. Apps that can’t take a folder open normally. On Windows, both desktop apps and Microsoft Store apps are listed. Store apps can’t be opened with a folder.

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Scripts

Scripts are a Pro action.
  • macOS: scripts run with /bin/bash.
  • Windows: a Shell menu offers the shells Vowen finds: Windows PowerShell (5.1, the default), PowerShell 7+ (pwsh, if installed) and Command Prompt. The menu only appears when more than one shell is found.
Scripts depend on your computer’s shell and may not run on another operating system.

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Custom utilities

Custom utilities are AI prompts you run with a keyboard shortcut on selected text or the clipboard, without speaking. They live on the Command Mode page.