iPhone Dictation Not Working in Trello? 10 Fixes That Work

Short answer: In Trello on iPhone, dictation uses the mic on your keyboard, so the keyboard has to be showing. Tap Add card, a card's title or its description until a cursor blinks. If words vanish, Return may have saved the card early, or you left the description without saving it.

You open Trello on your iPhone to get an idea onto a card before it slips away, and you would rather say it than type it with your thumbs. You tap the mic on your keyboard and nothing happens. Or there is no mic. Or there is no keyboard at all, however many times you tap the board. Or you dictate a card, and later find that half of it became a second card, the description you spoke is nowhere to be seen, or the card has jumped to a different list.

Trello on a phone is mostly about looking and moving. You swipe across boards, scroll down lists and drag cards from one column to the next. Very little of the screen accepts text. The keyboard, and the mic that lives on it, only appears when you open something you can write in: the field for a new card, a card's title, its description, a checklist item or the comment box. Each of those treats Return differently, and some of them hold your words as unsaved text until you confirm them.

So most Trello dictation problems are about the keyboard and about saving, not about your microphone. This guide works through every cause in order, starting with the most common. If dictation is failing in every app on your phone and not only in Trello, start with our complete guide to iPhone dictation not working instead. The same fixes apply to Trello on iPad.

How dictation reaches Trello on iPhone

Trello does not need a dictation feature of its own for you to write cards by voice. Keyboard dictation is part of the keyboard. You tap into a field, tap the mic key and speak, and the text arrives at the cursor exactly as if you had typed it. Trello cannot tell the difference, which is why the same rules apply to spoken and typed words alike.

That has one important consequence. If the keyboard does not appear, there is no mic to tap. Many Trello dictation problems are really "no keyboard" problems, and the fix is to open the right field rather than to change a setting.

The 30-second Notes test

Before you change anything, open the Notes app, create a new note, tap in the body so the keyboard appears, then tap the mic key and say a sentence.

• If dictation fails in Notes too, the problem is dictation on your iPhone, not Trello. Go to fixes 9 and 10.
• If it works in Notes but no keyboard appears in Trello, start with fixes 1 and 2, then check fix 7.
• If the keyboard appears but has no mic, or the mic will not start, go to fixes 3 and 9.
• If your words arrive but the card comes out split or reformatted, go to fixes 4 and 6.
• If your words vanish after you leave the card, or the card itself goes missing, go to fixes 5 and 8.

The 10 fixes, in order

1. Tap into a field, not the board

A Trello board is a set of lists you look at and move around. Swiping across it, scrolling a list or opening the board does not bring up the keyboard, because nothing is being written yet. The only places that take text are ones you have opened on purpose.

To write a new card, tap Add card at the bottom of the list you want. A text field opens in the list with the keyboard already up. To change an existing card, tap the card to open it, then tap the part you want to change: the title at the top, the description underneath, a checklist item or the comment box at the bottom. Opening a card is not enough on its own. You are looking at the card, not editing it, until you tap into its text.

Tap, do not press and hold. A long press on a card in a list picks it up so you can drag it, and a slight movement while it is lifted can drop it in another list or position. Swipes across the board scroll you to the next list. If you want a cursor, a single light tap is the gesture that gets you one.

2. Open the description and comment editors properly

Inside an open card, the description starts out as a placeholder inviting you to add one, and the comment area shows a short prompt at the bottom of the card. Those placeholders are not the editor yet. Tap directly on the placeholder text and wait a moment for the editing view to open and the keyboard to slide up.

The reliable sign that you are editing is a blinking cursor in the field, usually with a button to save or confirm appearing near it or at the top of the screen. If there is no cursor and no keyboard, you are still looking at the placeholder, and there is no mic to tap. The same goes for the title at the top of a card, which only becomes editable when you tap it.

If you use Trello's Inbox for quick capture, the same rule applies there. Tap the field so the keyboard appears, then dictate.

3. Find the mic key on your keyboard

If the keyboard appears but there is no mic, check which keyboard is showing. Apple's mic key sits at the bottom of Apple's keyboard, on the right on most current iPhones. Many third-party keyboards have no mic of their own, so if one of those is active there is nothing to tap. Tap and hold the globe key and switch to Apple's keyboard, or to a third-party keyboard that has a built-in mic.

If Apple's keyboard is showing and still has no mic, dictation is turned off or restricted on your iPhone. Fix 10 covers the settings, and our guide to a microphone button missing from the iPhone keyboard goes through every cause in more detail.

4. Keep Return out of card names

In most apps, Return starts a new line. In Trello's new-card field, Return usually adds the card and leaves the field open, ready for the next one. That is perfect when you dictate a list of short cards one after another, and confusing when you dictate a long thought. Saying "new line" or "new paragraph" while you dictate inserts a Return, so one idea can end up split across two cards, or cut off at the point where you paused.

A card name is meant to be short enough to scan on a board. For everything else, use the description, which is made for longer text and where Return starts a new paragraph instead of saving. Keep the name to a few words, then open the card and dictate the details into the description.

Checklists work the same way as new cards, and here it helps. In a checklist, Return usually adds the item and moves you to a fresh one, so you can dictate an item, say "new line", and dictate the next. If a sentence has already split in two, open the first card, tap the end of its title, and dictate or paste the rest back in. Then archive or delete the fragment.

5. Save the description before you leave the card

This fix is about text that arrived and then disappeared. In the description editor, your words only become part of the card once you save them. Leaving the editor with the back button, swiping the card closed or switching apps before you confirm can throw away what you dictated, or leave it waiting as an unsaved edit that nobody else can see.

Make saving part of the rhythm: dictate, read it back, save, then close the card. Comments work the same way. What you dictate into the comment box is only posted when you send it, so check it went through before moving on.

A weak connection deserves a thought too. Trello syncs your changes to its servers, and if you are offline or the signal drops as you save, the change may take a while to appear for your teammates. If a description looks different after you reopen the card, check your connection, give it a moment to sync, and dictate the missing part again if it never arrives.

6. Watch for mentions and formatting

The description and comment editors react to certain characters. An at sign opens a list of board members to mention, and while that list is showing, your next words are treated as a search for a person. Lines that begin like a list, with a dash, an asterisk or a number followed by a full stop, can be formatted as a list, and a few other characters at the start of a line can change the formatting too.

Dictation produces those characters when you say their names, and it also produces them from things you might not expect. An email address dictated into a comment brings an at sign with it, and a line that begins "one, confirm the budget" can come out as a numbered list. You have not lost anything when this happens. It is formatting, not deletion.

If a picker opens, tap outside it or delete the at sign, then carry on. If formatting appears that you did not want, shake your iPhone to undo, or use the undo button if your keyboard shows one. For mentions, it is easiest to dictate the sentence first, then type the @ and pick the person from the list. Our guide to dictating quotes and special characters covers how to say symbols when you actually want them.

7. Make sure you can edit this board

If fields will not open at all, however carefully you tap, you may not have permission to change the board. Trello boards can be viewed by people who are not members, such as a public board or a board shared across a Workspace, and some roles allow viewing, or viewing and commenting, without changing cards. Closed boards are read-only until someone reopens them.

The signs are consistent: no Add card at the bottom of lists, card titles that do nothing when tapped, or a comment box that opens while the description does not. If that is what you see, ask a board admin to add you as a member or change your access. Once you can edit, the keyboard and its mic will appear like anywhere else.

8. Find cards and words that went somewhere else

If you dictated and the result seems to be missing, it usually went somewhere you were not looking. Check these in order:

• The next card down. A spoken line break may have split your idea into two cards (fix 4).
• The bottom of the list. New cards are added where you opened the field, which is often the bottom of a long list you have to scroll to see.
• Another list. A long press that turned into a drag can drop a card in the next column (fix 1).
• The description or a comment. If the cursor was in the description or comment box, your words are under the title rather than in it, or still waiting unsent in the comment box.
• Archived cards. An archived card disappears from the board but can be found in the board's archived items and sent back.
• A filter. If the board is filtered, a card that does not match the filter is hidden from view.
• Search. If the search field was active, your words became a search, not a card.

If you still cannot find a card, search the board for a word from its title. And if you replaced something by accident, remember that dictation replaces any selected text, just as typing does. Shake to undo straight away, then tap once where you want the new words so nothing is highlighted before you tap the mic.

9. Free up the microphone

Dictation needs the microphone to itself. A phone or FaceTime call, a video call in another app, or a recording app still running in the background can all keep hold of it, and dictation may refuse to start until they let go. End the call or stop the recording, then try again.

Headphones are the next suspect. If the mic key does nothing, or dictation starts and gives up at once, disconnect your Bluetooth earbuds or headset and test with the iPhone's own microphone. If that works, the problem is the headset connection, not Trello. Our guide to iPhone dictation not working with AirPods walks through the headphone side.

10. Check dictation on your iPhone

If dictation failed in Notes too, the problem is on the phone. Open Settings, go to General, then Keyboard, and make sure Enable Dictation is on. If the switch is missing or greyed out, check Screen Time: under Content & Privacy Restrictions, open the allowed apps list and make sure Siri & Dictation is allowed. A work or school iPhone may also restrict dictation through its management profile.

Make sure the keyboard language matches the language you are speaking, since dictation follows the active keyboard. Then install any pending iOS update, update Trello from the App Store, and if nothing else has worked, restart your iPhone. A restart clears stuck audio sessions and keyboard processes in one step.

Trello quirks that look like broken dictation

• Dictation stops halfway through a thought. iPhone dictation stops when you pause for a moment. Our guide to iPhone dictation that keeps stopping explains what you can do about it.
• Every card name ends with a full stop. iPhone dictation adds punctuation automatically, which suits sentences better than card names. You can turn off Auto-Punctuation under Settings, General, then Keyboard, or simply delete the full stop.
• The keyboard closes while you are talking. Scrolling the card, tapping outside the field or bumping the board behind it can close the field, which closes the keyboard and stops dictation. Keep your thumb off the screen until your words have arrived.
• The card moved instead of opening. That was a long press, not a tap (fix 1). Drag it back, or use the card's move option to put it where it belongs.
• Names and project terms come out wrong. People's names, client names and project codenames are the words dictation mishears most. Read them back, because a card is only useful if the whole team can understand it later.

Quick triage

• No keyboard on the board: nothing is being written yet. Fix 1.
• No keyboard inside an open card: the placeholder is not the editor. Fix 2.
• Keyboard has no mic: a keyboard without a mic, or dictation off. Fixes 3 and 10.
• One idea became two cards: Return. Fix 4.
• Description vanished after you closed the card: it was never saved. Fix 5.
• A name picker opened, or a line became a list: mentions and formatting. Fix 6.
• Nothing on the board will open for editing: permissions. Fix 7.
• A card vanished or moved: check the places in fix 8.
• Mic starts then stops at once: microphone busy or Bluetooth. Fix 9.
• Fails in Notes too: iPhone dictation settings. Fix 10.

Trello on iPhone versus Trello on Mac

On a Mac, you dictate into Trello with a keyboard shortcut rather than a mic key, and the usual trap is Trello's single-key shortcuts, which can change a card if your words arrive while no field has focus. On iPhone there are no single-key shortcuts to trip over, but everything runs through the on-screen keyboard, so the first question is always whether the keyboard appeared, and whether it has a mic. The rest is the same on both: card names are one line, descriptions need saving, and at signs open a list of people. Our guide to Mac dictation not working in Trello covers the desktop side, and our guide to dictating Trello cards and checklists covers setup on both. If you keep personal tasks in another app, our guide to iPhone dictation not working in Todoist covers the same kind of problems there.

A dictation workflow that suits Trello

• One card per breath. Tap Add card, say a short card name, press Return, and say the next. You can empty your head of a dozen ideas in a minute.
• Details on the back of the card. Keep the name short enough to scan, then open the card and dictate the context into the description.
• Checklists by voice. Dictate one item, say "new line", dictate the next. This is the one place where a spoken Return does exactly what you want.
• Labels, dates and members by tap. Set them with Trello's own buttons once your words are in, rather than trying to say them.
• Save, then read back. A misheard name or a lost description is much harder to fix tomorrow than it is right now.

It is worth getting right, because speaking is much faster than typing. Most adults type around 40 words per minute on a full keyboard, and even professional typists usually sit around 80 to 100, while normal speech runs at 130 to 150 words per minute. On a phone the gap is wider still. That matters on a Trello board, where the card that is quick to write is the card that actually gets written, and a proper description is the difference between a card your team can act on and one that only makes sense to you.

A keyboard with a mic that works on every board

Apple's dictation is free and built in, but it stops when you pause, it depends on settings that are easy to switch off by accident, and fixing a misheard word means going back and editing by hand on a small screen.

Voice Keyboard Pro is a custom iPhone keyboard with a built-in mic button for dictation in any iOS app, Trello included. Tap Add card or open a description, tap the mic, speak, and your words are added at the cursor. Because it is a keyboard rather than a feature of one app, it works the same way in Trello, Notes, Messages and everywhere else you type. Like any keyboard, it only appears while Trello is editing text, and Trello still treats Return and at signs the same way once your words arrive, so fixes 1, 2 and 4 to 6 still apply.

A few features help with boards in particular:

• Voice Edit lets you speak a change to fix text, so you can correct a name or a date in a card without selecting and retyping it.
• Two-way translation while dictating, across 24 languages, lets you speak in one language and write in another, which helps on a shared board whose members read different languages.
• Swipe typing is there for the moments when speaking out loud is not practical.

Setup means adding the keyboard in Settings and allowing Full Access so it can reach the transcription service. Our guide to enabling Full Access for an iPhone keyboard explains what that permission does. On privacy, our servers store only operational pings. No audio and no transcript content is stored. There is a free tier with daily limits, and Pro is $4.99 a month or $34.99 a year. On a Mac, the same app lives in your menu bar: hold a hotkey, speak, release, and the text appears at your cursor in Trello or anywhere else.

Frequently asked questions

Why doesn't the keyboard appear in Trello?

Nothing is being written yet. Opening a board or a card shows you its contents but does not start editing. Tap Add card, or open a card and tap its title, description or comment box, and the keyboard will appear with its mic.

Why did my dictated card turn into two cards?

Return in the new-card field saves the card, and saying "new line" while dictating does the same. Keep card names to one short phrase and dictate longer text into the description.

Why did my card description disappear?

It was most likely never saved. The description editor keeps your words as an unsaved edit until you confirm them, and closing the card first can discard them. Dictate, read it back, save, and only then close the card.

Why did a card move when I tried to type in it?

A long press on a card picks it up for dragging. Use a single light tap to open a card or put a cursor in a field, and drag the card back if it landed somewhere new.

Does this work the same way on iPad?

Yes. Trello on iPad has the same card fields, Return behaviour and saving rules, so every fix here applies. The keyboard is larger, but the mic key works the same way.

What to do next

Run the 30-second Notes test, then work through the fixes that match what you saw. For most people it is fix 1 or fix 2: a board or card was open, but no field was being edited, so there was no keyboard and no mic. If a card split in two, it is fix 4, and if a description disappeared, check fix 5 before you dictate it again. And if you want dictation that works the same way in every app on your phone, try Voice Keyboard Pro's free tier on your next board.