Your iPhone has a powerful speech-to-text feature called ‘Dictation’ that transcribes whatever you say into the microphone. This feature comes in incredibly handy when your hands are occupied with a certain task and you need to shoot a quick text. However, users often report issues with this feature, especially since updating to iOS 16. In this article, we bring you the top 8 methods to fix the ‘iPhone dictation not working issue’ on iOS 16.
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Check the microphone
A malfunctioning microphone is the most likely reason that iPhone Dictation stopped working out of the blue. To check your iPhone’s microphone, send a voice note to a friend on any messaging app like WhatsApp and hear it back. If you cannot make out what you said or if your voice is muffled, the fault likely lies with your microphone. Since speech-to-text heavily relies on taking voice input through the microphone, it may have stopped working correctly because of the malfunctioning mic. Take your iPhone to the service centre to get its mic repaired.
Check if Dictation is enabled
Here’s how you can check if Dictation is enabled on your iPhone. Use this fix if you do not see the microphone icon on your keyboard at all.
Step 1: Go to Settings and select General.
Step 2: Select ‘Keyboard’.
Step 3: Turn the toggle bar on for ‘Enable Dictation’. Confirm your choice in the popup box.
Restart Siri
Restarting Siri may fix some of the temporary glitches that your iPhone may be facing.
Step 1: Go to Settings and select ‘Siri & Search’.
Step 2: Turn off all the toggle bars and then turn them back on.
Add the dictation language
If you are dictating in a language that is not enabled in the Apple Keyboard, it won’t be able to recognise it. Simply enable the language in Apple Keyboard and try again. Here’s how.
Step 1: Go to Settings and select General.
Step 2: Select Keyboard.
Step 3: Tap on ‘Keyboards’.
Step 4: Select ‘Add new keyboard…’
Step 5: Add the language you want to dictate it.
Step 6: Go back to Settings>General>Keyboard and tap on ‘Dictation languages’.
Step 7: Select the languages you want the dictation feature to recognise.
Reset Network Settings
For Dictation to work, you need an active and stable internet connection. The microphone icon for Dictation greys out when your iPhone is not connected to the Internet. Sometimes your iPhone may be connected to a Wi-Fi network or running mobile data yet the microphone icon may turn grey. This means something is wrong with the network. You can try resetting your iPhone’s network setting to fix this. Here’s how.
Step 1: Go to Settings and select General.
Step 2: Scroll down and select ‘Transfer or reset iPhone’.
Step 3: Select ‘Reset’ followed by ‘Reset Network Settings’.
Ensure Siri and Dictation aren’t restricted
Use this fix if you do not see the microphone icon on your keyboard at all.
Step 1: Go to Settings and select Screen Time.
Step 2: Tap on ‘Content and privacy restrictions’.
Step 3: Select ‘Allowed Apps’ and make sure that the toggle bar for Siri & Dictation is turned on.
Turn off Low Power Mode
Once your iPhone’s battery level drops down a certain threshold, it automatically turns on Low Power Mode. Some functions of your iPhone may stop working in Low Power Mode. If Dictation is one of them, you can try turning off Low Power Mode. Here’s how.
Step 1: Go to Settings and select Battery.
Step 2: Turn the toggle bar off for Low Power Mode.
Update the iOS version
Oftentimes, some features of your iPhone may experience unexpected issues because of bugs and other glitches. These issues are quickly resolved in the next update. Simply go to Settings>General>Software Update to update the software version.
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Conclusion
These are the top 8 methods to fix the ‘iPhone Dictation not working’ issue on iOS 16. If the issue still persists after trying all those fixes, try performing a factory reset on your iPhone. Make sure you back up all your personal data because a factory reset will clear your phone’s memory entirely. If you found this article helpful, let us know in the comments!
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