How to uninstall Type4Me on Mac

Type4Me is a free, open-source voice input app for Mac that lives in the menu bar, from its GitHub project. According to its README, it saves every raw transcript and processed result as searchable history that can be exported to CSV, and it snapshots history, modes, vocabulary, hotkeys and settings into local backups once a day, keeping the latest seven. Export what you want to keep before you remove anything. The README says you bring your own speech and language model API keys. Per its source (KeychainService.swift), the app saves them in your login keychain under the services com.type4me.scalar and com.type4me.grouped, and removing the app leaves those items there; delete them in Keychain Access if you no longer want them on this Mac. This guide covers the cloud edition disk image from the project's GitHub releases; the larger local edition with offline speech models and the iPhone keyboard app are not covered, and there is no Homebrew cask for it.

Quit and remove the app

  1. If you want your history, open it in Type4Me and export it to CSV. Copy anything else you want to keep, such as your modes and vocabulary, from the app's own screens.
  2. Quit Type4Me from its menu bar icon. The test recorded no login item or launch agent for it, but check System Settings › General › Login Items & Extensions in case you turned one on yourself.
  3. Open Finder, go to Applications and drag Type4Me to the Trash.

Removing the app does not cancel anything at your speech or language model providers. The API keys you entered belong to those providers, so revoke them in their consoles if you do not want them to stay valid.

Where the data lives

Press Shift + Command + G in Finder to open each path. Skip any path that is not on your Mac.

Location What it holds What to do
~/Library/Application Support/Type4Me The app's data, 180 KB in the test. The README puts your history, modes, vocabulary, hotkeys and settings with the app, and the test did not open the files to see which holds what Export your history first, then remove. Mole lists it for review and selects it by default.
~/Library/Application Support/Type4Me Backups 106 KB in the test. The name matches the README's daily local backups, and the test did not open it Removing this and the folder above leaves no copy of your history, so keep this one if you may reinstall. Mole lists it for review and selects it by default.
~/Library/Preferences/com.type4me.app.plist Preferences Remove. Selected by default.
~/Library/Caches/com.type4me.app Cache, 1.1 MB in the test Remove. Selected by default.
~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.type4me.app, ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.type4me.app.binarycookies Network storage and cookies Remove. Selected by default.
A temporary cache folder named com.type4me.app inside the folder getconf DARWIN_USER_CACHE_DIR prints Empty in the test Remove with the app. Selected by default.

Check the result

pgrep -il type4me
ls -d "$HOME/Library/Application Support/Type4Me"* "$HOME/Library/Caches/com.type4me.app" "$HOME/Library/Preferences/com.type4me.app.plist"
launchctl list | grep -i type4me
  • No output from pgrep means Type4Me is not running. A printed line is a process still alive; quit it from its menu bar icon or restart the Mac once.
  • A path printed by ls still exists. A surviving Type4Me Backups is expected if you chose to keep it. No such file or directory means that path is gone.
  • No output from launchctl means no Type4Me job is loaded for your user. A line means a background item is still registered; turn it off in Login Items & Extensions.

What Mole lists

Mole selects the app, the preferences file, the cache, both HTTPStorages entries and the temporary cache folder. It lists ~/Library/Application Support/Type4Me and ~/Library/Application Support/Type4Me Backups for review and selects them by default, so untick them if you want to keep your history or the backup copies. Before removing, Mole asks Type4Me to quit.

What this test covered

On November 9, 2026, the test downloaded the Universal cloud edition 3.2.0 disk image from the project's GitHub release, whose sha256 matched the official release, copied the app to Applications, opened it once and quit it. It was removed with a source-built, re-signed Debug build of Mole with every review row ticked; Mole's notarized release build was not used. Mole moved 7 rows and the app to the Trash with no failures, and nothing attributed to Type4Me was left. Status showed one Type4Me row with 1 process, and Mole found no update channel for the app, so no update was run. No account was signed in. Dictation, history export, the local edition, the iPhone keyboard and a Homebrew-managed uninstall were not tested.