How do I turn off auto Voice typing?

Auto voice typing refers to the feature on smartphones that allows users to speak into their phone and have their speech automatically converted into text. Popular virtual assistants like Siri, Google Assistant, and Bixby have voice typing capabilities built-in. When enabled, these assistants will automatically start transcribing speech into text in messaging apps, search bars, and other text fields.

While voice typing can be convenient for quickly creating hands-free content, some users may want to disable the feature for privacy reasons or to prevent it from unintentionally activating. For example, the microphone may pick up background conversations if auto voice typing is enabled. Turning off the feature prevents it from automatically starting and transcribing speech when you don’t intend it to.

Locate Your Phone’s Voice Typing Settings

To turn off voice typing on your phone, you first need to access the keyboard or language settings. Here’s how to find them:

1. Open the Settings app on your phone. On Android phones, this is usually an app icon that looks like a gear. On iPhones, open the Settings app.
2. Go to the Keyboard or Language & Input settings. On Android, look for a “Keyboards” or “Language & input” section in Settings. On iPhone, go to General > Keyboard.
3. You should now see a list of installed keyboards. Look for the one related to voice typing, like Google Voice Typing, Samsung voice input, or Dictation on iPhone.

Once in these keyboard settings, you can turn voice typing on or off. The steps may vary slightly by device, as covered next.

Turn Off Google Voice Typing

For Android devices using the Google keyboard Gboard, you can disable voice typing directly in the Gboard app settings. To turn off Google Voice Typing in Gboard:

1. Open the Gboard app on your Android device.

2. Tap on the Settings icon in the top right corner.

3. Select “Voice typing” under “Preferences”.

4. Turn off the “Use voice typing” toggle.

This will disable voice typing in Gboard so you can go back to manual typing on your Android device’s keyboard. If you want to turn voice typing back on later, simply go back to Gboard settings and toggle on “Use voice typing”. For more details, see this guide from Notta (https://www.notta.ai/en/blog/turn-off-google-voice-typing).

Turn Off Samsung Voice Typing

To turn off voice typing on Samsung devices, you need to access the Samsung keyboard settings and disable Voice Input. Here are the steps:

1. Open the Settings app on your Samsung device and tap on General management.

2. Tap on Language and input > On-screen keyboard > Samsung keyboard.

3. Tap on Voice input.

4. Toggle off the switch next to “Voice input” to disable voice typing.

This will completely turn off the voice typing feature in the Samsung keyboard so you won’t be able to use voice input when typing anymore. The Samsung keyboard will revert to normal text typing without automatic voice transcription.

You can always come back to these settings and toggle Voice input back on if you want to re-enable voice typing on your Samsung device later on.

For reference, here is a helpful video that shows the process step-by-step: how to turn off Samsung voice typing – YouTube

Turn Off iPhone Dictation

To turn off dictation on an iPhone, first open the Settings app. In Settings, scroll down and tap on General. Next, choose Keyboard from the list of options. In the Keyboard settings menu, find the toggle switch for Enable Dictation and tap on it to switch the setting to off. This will disable the microphone icon on your iPhone’s keyboard so you can no longer use dictation when typing.

The full steps are:

1. Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
2. Scroll down and tap on General.
3. Tap on Keyboard in the list of options.
4. Find the switch for Enable Dictation and tap it to turn it off.

With Enable Dictation toggled off, you will no longer see the microphone icon on your iPhone’s keyboard. Your device will stop automatically converting your speech to text when typing. This change applies to all text fields across iOS.

Use Airplane Mode

One simple way to turn off voice typing on your phone is to enable Airplane Mode. Airplane Mode disables all wireless connections, including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cellular data, GPS, and more. This has the effect of turning off voice typing functionality, since voice typing requires an internet connection to transmit audio data and convert speech to text.

To turn on Airplane Mode on an iPhone, open the Settings app and tap on the Airplane Mode option. Toggle the switch next to Airplane Mode to enable it. On Android, swipe down from the top of the screen to open Quick Settings and tap the Airplane Mode icon to enable it. You can also go into Settings and tap Network & Internet > Airplane Mode.

With Airplane Mode enabled, apps that require an internet connection will cease to function, including voice typing. This offers a quick way to disable voice typing temporarily if you find it is misbehaving or you want to prevent any accidental voice transcriptions. Just remember to disable Airplane Mode when you want to resume using voice typing as normal.

Of course, turning on Airplane Mode disables many other useful features that require internet access. It should only be used as a temporary solution if you need to quickly turn off voice typing capabilities on your phone.

Clear App Cache and Data

One way to potentially turn off voice typing is by clearing the app cache and data for apps that utilize this feature. This resets the app settings back to default.

To do this on an Android device:

1. Open your Phone’s Settings app.
2. Tap Apps or Application Manager.
3. Select the app you want to clear data for (e.g. Gboard for Google voice typing).
4. Tap Storage.
5. Tap Clear Cache and Clear Data.

Clearing app data often resets enabled services like voice typing. However, the feature may re-enable once the app updates again. This method works best for temporarily turning it off or troubleshooting issues.

According to one source, “clearing the data and the cache does allow voice typing to work again in Gboard.”

Factory Reset Your Phone

If you want to turn off voice typing completely and reset all of your phone’s settings, you can do a full factory reset. Before resetting your phone, make sure to backup any important data that you want to keep, such as photos, files, contacts, etc. You can backup data to your phone’s memory card or save it to cloud storage.

To do a factory reset, go to Settings > System > Reset options > Erase all data (factory reset). This will erase all data from your phone’s internal storage, including your accounts, apps, music, photos, and settings. It will return your phone to its original out-of-the-box state. Once the reset is complete, you’ll have to reconfigure any settings you want enabled again.

Doing a factory reset will turn off voice typing capabilities completely, as it resets any keyboard settings, input methods, and accessibility options you previously had configured. However, keep in mind this is a nuclear option that also deletes all your personal content and settings. But if you simply want to disable voice typing and aren’t concerned about losing everything else on your phone in the process, a factory reset will accomplish this.

Use a Different Keyboard

One of the easiest ways to turn off auto voice typing is to switch to using a different keyboard app on your Android phone. There are many high quality keyboard apps available that do not have built-in voice typing capabilities.

Some of the most popular keyboard apps without voice typing include Gboard, SwiftKey, Simple Keyboard, Typewise, and Fleksy. These keyboards focus purely on manual typing and do not include microphone icons or auto voice typing features.

To switch to a new keyboard app without voice typing on your Android phone:

1. Go to the Google Play Store and search for a keyboard app like Gboard or SwiftKey.
2. Download and install the keyboard app.
3. Open your device’s Settings app and go to System > Languages & input > Virtual keyboard.
4. Tap on the keyboard app you want to enable.

Once enabled, the new keyboard will replace your default keyboard across all apps on your device. You can now enjoy seamless typing without any automatic voice typing triggering unexpectedly.

Conclusion

There are several methods to disable voice typing on your smartphone if you find the feature to be disruptive or problematic. The main ways to turn off voice typing include going into your device’s settings and disabling Google Voice Typing, Samsung Voice Typing, or iPhone Dictation specifically. You can also use Airplane Mode to disable voice typing capabilities temporarily, clear your voice typing app’s cache and data which may reset its functionality, or do a factory reset on your device to erase all settings and data.

Users may want to turn off voice typing for several reasons. The automatic voice detection can sometimes result in accidental activation and transcription of conversations not meant to be typed. There are also privacy concerns around voice data being collected. Additionally, voice typing has limitations in accurately transcribing more complex vocabulary. Many users find toggling voice typing on and off is the best solution based on their situational needs.