iPhone dictation spells out names in all caps

iOS 26.6.2. When dictating texts, is there a way to spell out names, and have the first letter capitalised and the rest in lowercase? My husband is visually impaired and uses the microphone to dictate messages, but if there is a difficult name and he spells it out, it shows all in uppercase. It is very difficult for him to edit the text. I have tried various suggestions from Google for how to capitalise the first letter only but none of them work. If he adds a contact with phonetic spelling to Contacts, and then says the name instead of spelling it, it appears correctly. But there will be other names he wants to use, and he can't add a contact every time. Can anyone help? Thank you.

Posted on Oct 28, 2026 2:49 PM

1 reply

tillu_code

Level 4 (2,112 points)

Nov 4, 2026 8:07 PM in response to JM_mum

Spelling letter by letter comes out in capitals. That's how dictation treats letter names, and there isn't a setting that changes it. The command to try is "no caps" right before the letters, and "cap" only on the first one. For Jane, say: cap J, no caps a n e. Then pause. For names he uses a lot, add a text replacement so he doesn't have to spell them. Settings > General > Keyboard > Text Replacement. Put the name with normal capitals in Phrase, and a short word he can say in Shortcut. A contact with the phonetic name is still the most reliable when he can save the person. For a one-off, Speak Selection (Settings > Accessibility > Spoken Content) lets him hear the word and confirm it without hunting for the letters.