Hotkeys and voice
Kalam is driven by hotkeys for recording and by your voice for commands and quick actions.
Hotkeys
Set hotkeys in Settings → General → Keyboard shortcuts.
| Action | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Hold to dictate | Ctrl+Win | Hold to record, release to insert |
| Toggle dictation | — | Press to start, press again to stop |
| Toggle language | — | Swap your primary and secondary recognition languages |
| Voice editing | — | Hold, speak an instruction, rewrite the highlighted text (Pro, Windows) |
| Cycle modes | Ctrl+Shift+M | Switch to the next dictation mode |
The recording behavior setting decides which dictation hotkeys are live:
- Hold — only push-to-talk.
- Toggle — only press-to-start / press-to-stop.
- Both — either works.
A hold shorter than the minimum hold time (default 300 ms) cancels the dictation instead of inserting nothing.
Voice editing rewrites the text you have highlighted. Select text, hold the voice-editing hotkey, speak an instruction ("make this friendlier"), and release. Requires Pro and a configured AI model; Windows.
Voice commands
When a mode does not use AI polish, you can speak punctuation and edits inline. Toggle in Dictation → While dictating → Voice commands.
| Say | Result |
|---|---|
period / full stop | . |
comma | , |
question mark | ? |
exclamation mark / exclamation point | ! |
colon | : |
semicolon | ; |
dash / hyphen | - |
new line | line break |
new paragraph | paragraph break |
tab | tab |
undo | undo the last input |
delete that | delete the last dictated chunk |
scratch that | delete the last sentence |
Voice commands only run when AI polish is off — when polish runs, the AI handles phrasing and these phrases are left to it.
Voice actions
Start a dictation with a prefix to skip typing; optionally end with press enter to type then Return. Full table: Voice actions.
| Start with | Result |
|---|---|
new note … / save note … / remember this … | Note in Kalam |
online search … / search for … / look up … / ask google … | Web search |
youtube … / maps … / ask perplexity … | Search those sites |
go to … / open website … | Open an http(s) URL |
copy this … / copy that … | Clipboard (no paste) |
new task and new reminder still save as notes. Press enter / press return (end of utterance) is off until you enable it in Settings → Voice actions. These work on every plan; prefixes skip AI polish. Not the same as voice commands (new line still types a line break).
Quick defaults
Hold to dictate: Ctrl+Win
Cycle modes: Ctrl+Shift+M
Min hold time: 300 ms
Voice commands: on