Qenzo AI Dictation Keyboard vs superwhisper

Both products turn speech into finished text inside other apps. The difference is where the work happens and what shape the product takes: a phone keyboard versus a hotkey you trigger from inside another app, and — on superwhisper's side only — a one-time purchase as an alternative to a subscription.

On-device or cloud: the core difference

superwhisper's distinguishing feature is that transcription can run entirely on the device it's installed on. Its own models page lists eight offline speech models — three free (Whisper Fast, 75 MB; Whisper Nano, 150 MB; Whisper Standard, 500 MB) and five on Pro (Whisper Pro, 1.5 GB; Whisper Ultra V3 Turbo, 1.6 GB; Whisper Ultra V3, 3.0 GB; NVIDIA Parakeet V2 and V3) — plus seven offline language models for its rewriting step, from Microsoft's Phi-2 (1.8 GB) up to a 14 GB GPT-OSS 20B. Its privacy page states plainly: "Your data is not retained on Superwhisper servers. All data is only stored locally on your machine." Its offline-transcription page adds that with a local model "the audio is processed on your own hardware and never touches the internet."

Qenzo has no local model. Every dictation, the re-listening pass that corrects names and numbers, every tone rewrite and every translation is a cloud call — Qenzo's own site states this directly: "Needs internet: Yes for anything the AI does." Only typing, offline word suggestions, autocorrect and Latin-to-native transliteration work without a connection. If audio never leaving the device is a requirement rather than a preference, superwhisper's offline mode is the one of the two that satisfies it.

Phone keyboard vs. desktop hotkey

Qenzo installs as the Android system keyboard. You switch to it like any other keyboard, and it works, in Qenzo's own words, "inside WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram, Gmail, ChatGPT, Slack, Notion, LinkedIn, Discord, X, TikTok, YouTube ... anywhere a text field exists" — nothing to copy or paste. Desktop clients for macOS, Windows and Linux are also released.

superwhisper is not a keyboard replacement on any platform. On Mac and Windows it's a system-wide hotkey you trigger from inside whatever app already has focus. On iPhone its own page describes a standalone app: "you talk, superwhisper formats, you send" — you dictate inside the app, then move the result into the target app, rather than typing directly into it the way a keyboard does. superwhisper's own download page lists its platforms as "Available on Mac, Windows and iOS" — no Android app is offered today.

Price: a subscription on both sides, a free entry tier on both sides

Qenzo's free tier is one-time, not monthly: 20 actions with no account, 50 more once an email is linked, no card and no trial. Qenzo Pro is $9.99/month or $79/year on qenzo.ai ($79.99/year inside the app stores), with most countries paying a lower regional price, down to $1.99/month. There is no one-time-purchase option.

superwhisper's free tier is not action-limited on its site — it lists unlimited use of its free Whisper models, 100+ languages, meeting recording and email support, at $0. superwhisper Pro is $8.49/month on its pricing toggle, with a yearly option advertised as "2 months free," and a separate Lifetime one-time purchase also on offer (its exact price wasn't shown on the page checked for this comparison). superwhisper also sells an Enterprise tier — SOC 2 Type II certified, with centralized billing, model access control and volume discounts, custom pricing.

Languages: speaking vs. sending

Qenzo recognizes speech in 42 languages, or detects which one you're speaking, and lets you choose the output language per message, independent of the language you spoke — Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese and Cantonese count as three separate choices.

superwhisper's site advertises "100+ languages & dialects" for transcription, with automatic detection, and a Pro feature to "translate any language to English." That's a fixed direction — into English — not a per-message choice among many output languages the way Qenzo works. Offline accuracy also isn't uniform across languages: superwhisper's own offline-transcription page notes English is the strongest performer locally, with larger local models closing the gap to cloud accuracy for other languages.

Tone, recipient and rewriting

Qenzo separates the rewrite from the transcript: seven tones and eight kinds of recipient, chosen by the user, plus an author role (100 professions, or the user's own words, up to four vocabularies at once). Tapping a different tone rewrites the existing text rather than re-recording. Qenzo also re-listens to the recording against the generated text to fix names and numbers — except when a tone, recipient or role rewrite is applied, which replaces that re-listening pass with a rewrite instead.

superwhisper's equivalent is context-aware formatting driven by which app has focus — its own copy gives the example of staying casual in a messaging app and turning professional in an email client — plus custom prompts ("Super Mode") a user can write, run through either a cloud model (Claude, GPT, Gemini and Grok family models are listed) or a local one. It's a different mechanism: superwhisper infers the register from the app you're in, Qenzo asks you to choose it.

Privacy posture

superwhisper's privacy page is explicit: audio is "processed... locally on your device" when an offline model is selected, and the company states it does not retain audio or transcriptions on its servers. That is the stronger privacy claim of the two, and it only fully applies when a local model is chosen for both transcription and rewriting — pick a cloud model on either step and that audio or text does leave the device.

Qenzo's privacy claims are narrower in scope but real: the recording is never written to disk, Private mode leaves no history row, and everything can be exported or deleted. What Qenzo doesn't claim, and can't, is that audio stays on the phone — it can't, because there is no local model to process it with.

Qenzo vs superwhisper at a glance

Axis	Qenzo	superwhisper
Where the AI runs	Cloud only. Typing, suggestions, autocorrect and transliteration work offline; everything the AI does needs a connection.	Offline by default with local Whisper/Parakeet models and local rewriting models; cloud models also offered.
Platforms	Android (Google Play), macOS, Windows and Linux — all released, per Qenzo's own site. On iPhone, Qenzo requires iOS 17 or newer; there is no iPad version.	macOS, Windows and iPhone, per its own site. No Android app listed.
How it reaches other apps	Installs as the Android system keyboard itself — types directly into WhatsApp, Gmail, and any other app.	A system-wide hotkey on Mac/Windows triggered from inside another app. A standalone app on iPhone you send text out of, not a keyboard extension.
Price	Free: 20 actions with no account, plus 50 more with email, one-time. Pro $9.99/mo or $79/yr (qenzo.ai); regional pricing to $1.99/mo. No lifetime option.	Free: unlimited use of local Whisper models. Pro $8.49/mo; yearly billing advertised as 2 months free; separate Lifetime one-time purchase; Enterprise custom.
Languages recognized	42, or auto-detected.	100+ languages and dialects, per its site; local-model accuracy is strongest in English.
Output-language switching	Choose the output language per message, independent of the spoken language — 42 options.	Pro feature translates into English only; not a per-message choice among many output languages.
Tone / recipient rewriting	7 tones and 8 recipient types chosen by the user, plus an author role; a new tone rewrites existing text.	Formatting adapts automatically to the focused app, plus user-written custom prompts ("Super Mode").
Privacy posture	Recording never written to disk; Private mode leaves no history row; export or delete anytime — but audio leaves the device for the AI step.	With a local model, audio "never touches the internet," per its site; company states data is not retained on its servers.

Who should buy superwhisper instead

A Mac or Windows user whose dictation must never touch a server — legal work, medical notes, or just a personal aversion to sending recordings anywhere — should buy superwhisper and pick a local model for both transcription and rewriting. It also fits someone who mainly dictates into whichever app already has focus and wants a hotkey rather than a full keyboard, or who would rather pay once for a Lifetime license than subscribe indefinitely. On the evidence of its own site, it is not a phone keyboard, and it is not shipped for Android.

Qenzo is the fit when the phone's own keyboard is the target — replacing it rather than sitting alongside it — when the same message needs to go out in a language other than the one spoken, or when a tone or a professional register needs to change with one tap instead of a re-recording.