Show HN: Subvocal – Talk to your computer without making noise
- ID
- 42231
- Status
- summarized
- Published
- 03 Nov 2026, 1:16 AM
- Fetched
- 03 Nov 2026, 7:45 AM
- Provider
- Hacker News
- Category
- dev-community
- Original URL
- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50340088
- Source URL
- https://hnrss.org/best
Summary
- Score
- 7.0
- Created
- 03 Nov 2026, 7:46 AM
- Tags
- Audience
- developersvibe_codersai_agent_users
What happened
Aarush and Arnav, posting as The Subvocal Company (YC F26), showed off smart glasses that decode silently mouthed words into text at speech speed using RF signals that pass through the face and get modulated by the tongue, lips and soft palate. They started at TreeHacks in February with EMG electrodes taped to a face, dropped EMG over sweat, electrical interference and placement variability, then had their first glasses prototype fail completely and reverted to antennas taped to skin. The Show HN thread drew 482 points and 264 comments, but the post contains no price, ship date, SDK or developer access.
Why it matters
There is nothing to install, buy or integrate yet — no price, no dev kit, no date — so do not plan a roadmap around it. The concrete signal is the constraint they started from: daily Wispr Flow users who couldn't use voice input in a library or open office. If your product assumes the user can talk out loud, that same wall applies to your agent or dictation UX, and you need a typed or push-to-talk fallback for shared and quiet spaces.
Discussion angle
Silent input as the missing piece for voice-first agents: is mouthing words with your lips closed a real interaction model, or does the awkwardness cap it at a niche? Ask the room what they'd actually build if text input worked in a silent room — and whether a wearable input layer beats just typing.