Desktop v1.0.18 shipped this week alongside a rapid-fire run of CLI releases (v1.0.3 through v1.0.15). The headline additions: global keyboard shortcuts from anywhere on your Mac, a new Lite plan, and the first building blocks for todo and activity-capture integrations.
CLI shortcuts and native overlay
The CLI now supports global keyboard shortcuts. Run char shortcut install and a lightweight macOS daemon registers a system-wide hotkey that starts or stops recording no matter which app is in focus. When triggered, a small SwiftUI overlay shows a live waveform so you know it's listening. The daemon runs as a launchd service, so it survives restarts and stays out of your way.
Other CLI additions this week: a play command for audio playback, a skill command for installing reusable workflows, an update command for self-updates, and a much-improved TUI with a real waveform visualizer and better input handling.
Lite plan
A new Lite pricing tier sits between Free and Pro. The plan grid is now shared across the desktop app and the website so messaging stays consistent everywhere you see it. If you're already on a plan, there's a new switch-plan flow to move between tiers.
Chat with context
The chat panel now supports typed mention context. When you reference a session or a contact in the composer, the mention carries structured data — not just a name string — so the AI has richer context to work with. The composer also caps its editor height and scrolls internally for long drafts, and the send button stays visible no matter how much you type. Hotkeys for starting a new chat are routed through shared state, so they work consistently whether the chat panel is docked or floating.
Templates as a first-class tab
Templates moved out of settings and into their own sidebar tab. The new layout mirrors how calendar and contacts work: a sidebar list on the left, details on the right. Personal template editing is smoother — select a template, tweak it, save — without bouncing through nested settings pages. The note-input header also got a revamped template picker for faster switching during a meeting.
Calendar polish
v1.0.18 brought a batch of calendar refinements. The month header now shows a "Syncing" spinner during refresh. Events sort by all-day status and start time. Provider chevrons only appear on hover. There's a new Calendar tab in Settings for managing permissions and providers, and you can launch Google Calendar connection directly from the empty provider row. The Google Calendar badge also updated from "Internal Use Only" to "Beta."
Speaker assignment and transcript fixes
You can now manually assign speakers to transcript segments. Click a speaker label, pick from your contacts, and the assignment sticks. Under the hood, the transcript rendering pipeline was refactored — speaker mapping, segment collection, and word stitching all got cleaner, which fixes a few edge cases where labels drifted during long recordings.
Export gets memo support
The export modal now includes a memo option for PDF and text formats. If you've written notes alongside the transcript, you can include them in the export. Uploaded audio files also estimate their recording date from file metadata, so imported sessions land on the right day in your timeline.
Todo and activity-capture scaffolding
Two new plugin skeletons landed: plugins/todo and plugins/activity-capture. The todo plugin wires up Apple Reminders and Linear — list teams, list tickets, create and complete items — all from within Char. Activity capture lays groundwork for detecting what's happening on your Mac: which browser tab is open, whether you're in a Slack huddle or listening to Spotify. These are early scaffolds; expect them to surface in the UI over the coming weeks.
Under the hood
- VAD chunking v2: A new voice-activity-detection chunking engine (
vad-chunking2) is in development for more accurate audio segmentation. - Multi-channel denoise: The denoiser is now channel-aware, handling stereo and multi-track recordings correctly.
- Notarized DMGs: macOS disk images are now notarized and stapled, so Gatekeeper won't flag them on first launch.
- Soniox language field: Missing language parameter added to the Soniox live adapter — fixes transcription in non-English sessions.
- AssemblyAI fixes: Language normalization and batch handling improvements for the AssemblyAI provider.
- Degraded-state indicators: If your mic disconnects or audio capture enters a degraded state, the tab and tray icon now make it visually obvious.
Full version details on the changelog.