Dictation for nurses that charts at the speed of the floor

Speak your shift notes, care plans, and SBAR handoffs straight into the EHR — with nursing vocabulary, AI that cleans up the wording, and audio that can stay on your device. Free on Mac and Windows.

Download for macOS Download for Windows

Free download. No account required.

Documentation shouldn't outlast your shift

Nursing is already a full shift before you add the charting. Vitals, intake and output, med passes, wound care, a care plan update, and a handoff note at the end — it adds up to hours at a keyboard that should have been hours at the bedside. And when you finally sit down to catch up, generic dictation chokes on the abbreviations and shorthand that fill a nursing note.

Vowen is dictation built to keep pace with a unit. It learns nursing vocabulary, types into whatever EHR or eMAR field your cursor is in, and can run entirely on your machine — so you can speak the note while the assessment is fresh and clock out closer to on time.

Hold a key, talk, let go. The text lands where your cursor is, in any app.

Documentation that keeps up with a 12-hour shift

Quick, private, and fluent in how nurses actually chart.

Audio can stay on your device

Vowen transcribes locally with on-device models by default, so a dictated note about a patient doesn't have to leave your machine. Optional cloud AI stays off until you enable it with your own key.

Knows nursing shorthand

Add the terms a nursing note is built from — 'PRN every 4 hours', 'SBAR', 'Foley', 'PO intake' — and Vowen remembers them so your charting reads right instead of being phonetically guessed.

Types into your EHR or eMAR

Vowen writes wherever your cursor is — a progress note, a care-plan field, a handoff template, a secure message. No integration to set up and nothing to copy and paste between systems.

Shapes a spoken update into a clean note

Optional AI cleanup removes filler and fixes punctuation, and can format a spoken assessment into a structured SBAR or a tidy shift-summary paragraph ready to drop in.

Chart at the bedside, not after

Dictating the assessment in the room means it's captured while it's fresh, instead of reconstructed from memory at the end of a long shift. Less recall, fewer missed details.

99 languages

Care for multilingual patients and document across 99 languages — Vowen can transcribe and translate so a bedside conversation makes it into the chart.

It speaks fluent nursing note

Add the terms your unit uses and Vowen keeps them. A few examples of what it handles:

PRN every 4 hoursSBAR handoffvital signs stableFoley catheter patentambulating in hallwayPO intake 800 mLwound dressing changedsaline lock flushed

Vowen's Dictionary with names and jargon it has learned — The Dictionary: names and jargon Vowen should always get right.

Worth knowing

An honest note on HIPAA & compliance

Vowen is general-purpose dictation software — not a certified medical or HIPAA-compliant product, and we don't offer a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) today. Because transcription can run entirely on your device, your audio doesn't have to be sent anywhere, but you remain responsible for handling protected health information (PHI) under your facility's policies. If you dictate PHI, confirm your setup with your compliance team and leave optional cloud AI features off unless they've been approved.

Common questions.

Still deciding? Ask us anything.

Can nurses use Vowen for charting?

Yes. Vowen lets you speak shift notes, assessments, care-plan updates, and SBAR handoffs into any EHR or eMAR field, with a custom dictionary for nursing terms and on-device transcription so the audio can stay on your machine.

Does it understand nursing abbreviations?

Add the abbreviations and shorthand your unit uses — 'PRN', 'PO', 'SBAR', 'q4h' — to Vowen's dictionary and it remembers them, so your charting transcribes the way you'd write it instead of being guessed phonetically.

Does it work with our EHR or eMAR?

Vowen types wherever your cursor is, so it works in web-based EHR and eMAR fields and any other text box without a dedicated integration. If you can click into the field and type, you can dictate into it.

Is patient information kept private?

By default Vowen transcribes on-device, so a dictated note doesn't have to leave your computer. Cloud AI features are optional and only run if you enable them with your own API key. Vowen isn't a certified HIPAA product — see the compliance note above.

Is it free for nurses?

Core dictation is free, with a one-time Pro upgrade for the advanced features and no per-seat subscription. See the pricing page for current details.