as·say· a-SAY
verb. To test ore and learn how much gold is really in it. From the Old French essai, a trial, the same root as essay.
Named for the assay offices of the old gold camps, where a prospector found out what his claim was truly worth. Assay your pages.
Write at the keyboard.
Or out loud.
A complete, professional screenwriting app for the Mac: everything you'd expect from editors that cost several times as much, plus one thing they don't do. Assay takes dictation. Type a scene, talk the next one, or switch between the two in the middle of a line.
For macOS 26 and later. Free to download and write in.
INT. ASSAY OFFICE - NIGHT
A single lamp. RUTH CALLOWAY, forties, sleeves rolled, sets a bead of gold on the balance. She doesn't breathe until the needle settles.
RUTH
(to herself)
That's not right. Nothing out of that gulch runs that rich.
She tests it again. Same number.
RUTH (CONT'D)
Somebody wants me to believe it does.
A complete screenwriting app
Everything you need at the keyboard.
Assay is a full screenwriting editor first. It knows what you're writing as you write it. Type INT. and it's a scene heading. Press Tab for a character and Return for dialogue. You never pick an element from a menu.
Pages break the way a production expects: (MORE) and (CONT'D) across pages, no orphaned scene headings, and every act on a fresh page. A page is about a minute of screen time, and the count is always in view.
- Saves as Fountain, plain text that's yours forever
- Opens and exports Final Draft (.fdx) files
- Opens script PDFs and rebuilds the formatting
- Exports print-ready PDFs with a proper title page
- One-hour drama acts: Teaser, Act One and on, and a Tag
INT. ASSAY OFFICE - NIGHTTabRUTHTab(to herself)ReturnThat's not right.CUT TO:ACT ONERUTH · EXT. GULCH - NIGHTDictation, when you want it
Type it. Say it. Or both.
Some of the best television was written out loud. When a scene wants to be spoken, press ⇧⌘D and talk: say who's talking, and your words land on the page as dialogue, action or a scene heading, already formatted. When you want the keys again, just type. There's no mode to switch and nothing to clean up.
Speech recognition runs on your Mac. It learns your cast list, so names come out spelled right, and when it mishears a word you can teach it the fix once.
- Character names and places from your script help recognition
- Right-click any word to correct it, everywhere or in dialogue only
- Type and talk in the same scene: dictation waits while your fingers are moving
- Start it on purpose with ⇧⌘D. It never listens when you haven't asked it to
Interior assay office, nightScene heading
Dialogue Ruth, that's not rightCue and speech
Paren, to herselfParenthetical
Action, she tests it againAction
Cut toTransition
Scratch thatRemoves the last phrase
Hands-Free Mode
Write from the couch. Or the floor.
Hands-Free Mode turns your Mac into a writing room. Put the page on a big screen across the room, lie back, and work by voice: write, fix, move around, and hear it read back. You never touch the keyboard.
- “Next scene”, “top of scene”, “go to scene 12”
- “Go to Ruth's line” jumps to her next speech
- “Undo”, “delete line”, “new paragraph”
- “Read that back” plays your last speech in the character's voice
RUTH
Somebody wants me to believe it does.
Card Board
Break the story before you write it.
The best writers' rooms break a season on a corkboard, one index card per beat. Assay gives you that board in its own window, so you can put it on a second display and keep your plan in view while you write.
Cards go up in pencil. When a beat earns its place, lock it in marker. Drag cards to rearrange an act, or move a beat from Act Two to the Teaser.
- Rows for a Cold Open, Teaser, Acts One to Five and a Tag, or your own
- Type a card, press Return, and the next card is ready
- Cork, pin-hole, paper or your own color
- Saved inside your script file, and it never prints
Table Read
Hear it before anyone else does.
Give each character a voice and play a scene or a whole act. A narrator takes the action and headings. A stopwatch runs beside the page estimate, so you know if that six-page scene actually plays in four.
- Uses the high-quality voices built into macOS
- Reads from the cursor, highlighting as it goes
- Adjustable speed, and the narrator can be switched off
And the everyday things
Built for rewriting.
Notes
Highlight a passage and leave yourself a note. Notes never print, and they travel to Final Draft as ScriptNotes.
Snapshots
Drafts are saved automatically as you work. Compare any two side by side, or bring back one scene from last week.
Rename
Change a character's name once and every cue, line and mention follows, in one undo.
Scene list
Every scene with its page and who speaks in it. Click to jump, or say the scene number.
Automatic (CONT'D)
When a character keeps talking after action, Assay adds the (CONT'D) on the printed page for you.
Title page
Title, author, draft date and contact details, laid out the way readers expect.
Your script never leaves your Mac.
No account, no cloud, no tracking. Speech recognition happens on your Mac, and your pages are plain files that you own. The only download is the speech model, once, the first time you dictate.
Pricing
Free to write. Pay once for the rest.
No subscription. Buy the Full Version once and it's yours, on every Mac signed in with your Apple Account.
Free
- Type, save, open and copy, with no limits ever
- Full formatting, scene list, notes and snapshots
- The Card Board
- Dictation, Hands-Free Mode, Table Read and export for your first 15 pages
Full Version
- Dictation and Hands-Free Mode on every page
- Table Read for the whole script
- PDF, Final Draft and print export
- A one-time in-app purchase on the Mac App Store
Assay Screenwriter is coming soon to the Mac App Store.