iOS Text-to-speech

Feature Name: iOS Speak Selection

iOS Version Review: iOS 9

What it Does: Speak selection is the system level text-to-speech tool in iOS. When enabled, it allows your device to read whatever is on your screen to you using the Samantha voice by default. To enable speak selection, you first have to go to settings. Once there, navigate to the general tab where you will find the accessibility section. There are a lot of goodies in here (you can check out Accessibility Guide for more info), but we are looking for “Speech” tab (the fifth option from the top) and that is where you will find speak selection and its related settings. Most of the settings are pretty self-explanatory- you can enable iOS to highlight content as its spoken, you can adjust the speaking rate, and you can choose which voice you prefer to use. Once you have the settings to your liking, there are two ways to activate speak selection:

  • Text Select: Just tap and select the text you wish to listen to (it can be a single word or entire paragraph) and choose “speak” from the list of options. Once it starts speaking, you can pause it, BUT then you press speak again it will start from the beginning. 
  • Speak Screen: The second options is to use the speak screen. This option is much easier to use if you have a longer body of text you wish to listen to. To activate, just swipe with two fingers from the top of the screen. One of the nice features of speak screen is that it displays a setting bar at the top of the screen that lets you adjust individual settings. Among them are the rate of speech, play and pause, and you can adjust the line it is speaking (advance to the next line or to the previous line). When you are not using the setting bar, it will retract to the side of the screen (you can locate it where ever you want) and dims out. 

Some Notes:

  • Not all apps play nicely with Speak Screen, and you will sometimes get a message saying “No speakable content could be found on this screen.”  
  • If you are using an iPhone 5s, iPad Air or iPad Mini 2 (or later device) you can download and use Alex as your  voice. Alex is one of the default voices on OS X and is one of my favorite voices to use.  The only downside is that it is a 870MB download.
  • Speak screen will work in the background. So if you start it in another app and exit, it will continue until it is done the selection.