Let it read the page out loud to you
Have the computer read an article, a letter or a long document to you, in a voice you chose.
Computer voices used to be a joke — flat, robotic, and exhausting after two sentences. That changed a few years ago and the news has not traveled.
A modern American voice reads a newspaper article well enough that you stop noticing it is a computer. It is free, it is already installed, and it is two presses away.
On a Mac the same job is called Spoken Content. Switch it on under System Settings, then Accessibility, then Spoken Content, and it will read anything you have highlighted when you press Option and Esc.
Key points
- Have any web page read aloud in a natural voice you chose
- Set the speed so it is comfortable, and let the browser remember it
- Have Word read your own letter back, to catch what your eyes skip over
- Tell Read aloud apart from Narrator, and turn Narrator off if it starts by accident
What to remember
- It highlights each word as it goes, so you can follow along or look away entirely.
- If you turn on Narrator by accident, press Ctrl, Windows and Enter together to turn it off again.
- Hearing your writing is the quickest way to catch a missing word. It works far better than reading it again.
Try this
Open any long article in your browser and look for the small speaker or the words Read aloud near the address at the top. Give it one paragraph — the voices are much better than you expect.
Practice: Let it read the page out loud to you. Your first lesson is free, with no account or card; the rest are part of a Lantern plan. Interactive lessons require JavaScript.