List of Voice Commands for Symbols in Windows and Mac

Windows operating system offers multiple ways to insert symbols, emoji and special characters. You can use alt keys, emoji panel or character map app and insert symbols in any text area like chatting apps and documents. Similarly, you can use character viewer and option code shortcuts in macOS for typing symbols. However, do you know that you can easily insert symbols using voice commands? In this article, we will explain how to use voice commands and list of commands to insert popular symbols.

Using Voice Typing in Windows and Mac

Voice commands work in Windows and Mac without any additional setup. All what you need is to press “Win + H” keys in Windows PC to open voice typing toolbar. On Mac, press the function key twice to open dictation toolbar. In both cases, you will see a microphone icon which you can press and start speaking the command. After inserting a symbol, you can continue typing with keyboard or press the microphone icon again to disable voice typing. Learn more about how to use voice typing and dictation feature in Windows and Mac.

Voice Commands for Symbols

Below is the list of voice commands you can use to insert symbols in English language. Good part is that most of the commands are same in Windows and Mac like dollar sign or degree sign.

Symbol	Windows Voice Command	Mac Voice Command
_	Underscore	Underscore
–	Hyphen	Hyphen
–	Minus sign	Minus sign
—	M-dash	Dash
・		Centre dot
,	Comma	Comma
;	Semicolon	Semicolon
;)	Winky face	Winking face – looks ;-)
:	Colon	Colon
:(	Frowny face	Frowny face – looks :-(
:)	Smiley face	Smiley face – looks :-)
!	Exclamation mark Exclamation point	Exclamation mark
?	Question mark	Question mark
.	Period Full stop	Period Point Dot Full stop
…	Ellipsis Dot dot dot	Ellipsis
‘s	Apostrophe-s	Apostrophe ‘
‘	Begin single quote Open single quote	Begin single quote
’	End single quote Close single quote	End single quote
“	Open quotes	Quote
”	Close quotes	End quote
(	Left parentheses Open parentheses	Open parenthesis
)	Right parentheses Close parentheses	Close parenthesis
[	Left bracket Open bracket	Open bracket
]	Right bracket Close bracket	Close bracket
{	Left brace Open brace	Open curly bracket
}	Right brace Close brace	Close curly bracket
§	Section sign
¶	Paragraph sign Paragraph mark
@	At sign At mention	At sign
*	Asterisk	Asterisk
/	Forward slash	Forward slash
\	Backslash	Backslash
&	Ampersand And sign	Ampersand
#	Number sign Pound sign	Hashtag sign
%	Percent sign	Percent sign
`	Backquote Backtick
^	Caret symbol	Caret
°	Degree symbol Degree sign	Degree sign
©	Copyright sign Copyright mark	Copyright sign
®	Registered sign	Registered sign
+	Plus sign	Plus sign
±	Plus or minus sign
÷	Division sign
×	Multiplication sign	Multiplication sign
<	Left angle bracket Open angle bracket Less than sign	Open angle bracket Less than sign
<3	Heart emoji
=	Equal sign	Equal sign
>	Right angle bracket Close angle bracket Greater than sign	Close angle bracket Greater than sign
|	Vertical bar sign Vertical bar character Pipe character	Vertical bar
~	Tilde symbol
●		Large centre dot
¢		Cent sign
$	Dollar sign	Dollar sign
£	Pound Sterling sign	Pound Sterling sign
¥	Yen sign	Yen sign
€	Euro sign	Euro sign
™		Trademark sign
XD		Cross-eyed laughing face

Though there are limited symbols you can insert with voice commands, they are useful especially when keyboard shortcuts are not working on your computer.

Example of Inserting Symbol with Voice Command

Let us say, you want to insert copyright symbol in a Word or Pages document.

• Press “Win + H” and say, “copyright sign” to insert the symbol.
• Two times press the function key and say, “copyright sign” on Mac.

Note: If you want to insert colorful emoji symbols, then use emoji panel in Windows and Character Viewer app in Mac. Microsoft Word also comes with dictate function with separate set of voice input commands which you can use instead of the above listed commands.