Text To Speech Software For Mac Os X
- Free Software For Mac Os
- Text To Speech Software Mac Os X
- Best Speech To Text Software
- Text To Speech Software For Mac Os X El Capitan
- Text To Speech App Mac Os X
Edit a video without using a mouse or trackpad. Build a presentation without seeing the screen. Or track down important files for your next project with just your voice. Because Mac is designed for everybody to create amazing things.
Voice ControlUse your voice to make things happen.
Now you can fully control your Mac using only your voice.1 Quickly open and interact with apps, search the web, and write and edit more efficiently with rich text editing commands. So you can simply say, “Move up two lines. Select previous word. Capitalize that.” And your Mac does it.
VoiceOverYou don’t need to see your Mac to use your Mac.
VoiceOver is a revolutionary built-in screen reader that’s more than a text-to-speech tool. It tells you exactly what’s on your screen and talks you through actions like editing a video, building a presentation, or quickly navigating from one app to another.
Text to Speech Go from written word to spoken word. If you learn better when you can hear what you’re reading or writing, Text to Speech lets you highlight any text and have your Mac read it aloud. And you can choose from more than 70 male or female voices across 42 languages.
Hover TextGet a quick size boost of what you’re reading.
Move your cursor over any text — a paragraph, a caption, a headline — then press Command for a bigger, high-resolution version of what you selected. Hover Text also lets you choose the fonts and colors that work best for you.
SiriMake requests by talking or typing.
Siri on Mac lets you quickly find and open files, set reminders, send text messages, and more, making it easy to handle the things you do every day.2 With “Type to Siri” mode, you can make requests using a physical or onscreen keyboard. And Siri can also predict your next word based on what you’ve said before, so you can minimize typing over time.
Text to SpeechGo from written word to spoken word.
Free Software For Mac Os
If you learn better when you can hear what you’re reading or writing, Text to Speech lets you highlight any text and have your Mac read it aloud. And you can choose from more than 70 male or female voices across 42 languages.
Whether you prefer articles read to you while you do something else or trying to grasp a new foreign language or even for specially abled students, TTS (short for text-to-speech) has proved to be very useful.
In our previous articles we saw some of the best text to speech apps for Windows and Android. And today, we take a look at some of the best TTS options available for Macs.
Text To Speech For Mac
1. macOS TTS
Before we get too ahead of ourselves and start downloading third party apps, it is very trivial to know that macOS itself comes with a built-in TTS and you can use it anywhere on your computer from the Notes app to any browser.
To get started, highlight or select the text which you want to be read and then right click, go to Speech and then to Start Speaking; and your Mac should start reading the text to you. It also supports a lot of other languages other than English and there are a lot of voices to choose from in all the languages. To change the language option simply go to Accessibility > Speech. Although some voices are very robotic, there are a few which aren’t and sound more like a human.
But the TTS is far from perfect; it is very basic and barebones and lacks options like pause/play, picking up from a selected word instantly and a lot more.
Quick Tip: It blew my mind and might even blow yours to know that the native TTS on Mac also supports converting your text into audio files. Just select the required text, right click and go to Services > Add to iTunes as a spoken track. The text will be converted to an audio track and added to your iTunes library.
Pros:
– Built-in system wide
– Lots of voice options
– Converting text to iTunes track
Cons:
– No Pause/Play
– Have to select manually all the words to be read
– No instant pickup
Verdict:
Overall, the TTS that comes with macOS is very barebones without all the bells and whistles and should be perfect for somebody looking for a basic TTS experience without even buying or installing any third party software.
2. Invicta TTS
Invicta TTS is a very simple free Text To Speech app available on the Mac App Store.
Once you open up the app, it presents you with a text box where you can enter or paste any text which will be then converted to speech. The app is very lightweight and minimal in nature with everything being to the point.
Although the app is very basic, unlike the built in TTS of Mac OS, it does add the option of playing or pausing the audio which becomes crucial when listening to long texts or articles. The voice settings cannot be changed but the in built voice does the job pretty good enough.
Pros:
– Minimal and Light
– Play/Pause Option
Cons:
– Cannot read documents automatically
– Supports only English
Verdict:
If you need a simple and light TTS app and might be listening to long articles, Invicta TTS does the job pretty well but do remember that it can only read English.
Link: Get Invicta TTS on the App Store
Price: Free
3. Natural Reader
The next app on our list is Natural Reader which is an extremely powerful TTS software available not only on Mac OS but also on Windows, iOS, Android and even has an online reader.
The app comes in many flavours, each with its fair share of features for the price. The free version comes with basic TTS features along with the ability to read directly from file formats such as Docx, PDF, ePub and Txt. It also has a floating bar which can be used to read text while you are in other applications. The next option or the Personal version, at a steep $100, allows you to read web pages directly, converting text to audio files and syncing everything between your phone apps. There are also Professional and Ultimate versions which add OCR support and a bunch of natural voices.
Pros:
– Support for file formats
– Convert to audio files
– Cross Platform
– OCR Support
Cons:
– Pricey
– No instant pickup
Verdict:
All the features of Natural Reader definitely come at a price and you should be able to decide whether it is a suit for you with respect to your investment in TTS, but even for a casual user the free version works really well. Overall, Natural reader is not just best text to speech software with natural voices, but since it also support PDF, it’s also a good option for those who are looking for PDF Voice Reader for macOS.
Pricing Options: Pricing for Natural Reader
Link: Download Natural Reader from here
4. Read Aloud
Read Aloud is not exactly a stand alone Mac app but instead a Chrome extension which might appeal to some people. Considering how many posts and articles are read on the internet everyday, we had to include Read Aloud.
It is completely free and once you install it, its icon will appear in the extension bar which you can now use to read any webpage or any online article, just by a single click. When it is in work, you get a play/pause button along with a forward or rewind button which can be used to advance or backtrack paragraphs. Considering it is free, the voice options are really good and feel very natural and premium.
Pros:
– Great natural voice
– Forward or rewind by paragraphs
– Listen to webpages
Cons:
– Works only on Chrome
Verdict:
Suggesting Read Aloud is very straight forward; if you are someone who reads a lot on the internet and are looking for a free TTS software for that, nothing beats Read Aloud.
Price: Free
Link: Download Read Aloud from the Chrome Store
Text To Speech Software Mac Os X
5. Capti Voice
Capti Voice is probably the most polished and well rounded TTS software available for the Mac and the award are only there to justify that. Starting off, Capti Voice uses your browser for the app to function instead of a stand alone Mac application. Don’t worry, you can still use it while you are offline as it stores all its data locally and personally I have had no issues.
Free apps for mac os x. (4) F.lux F.lux is a utility free apps for mac os x which will run in the background of your system and will help you in changing the background and color of the screen of your system. Computers release blue light which can harm the human eye. With F.lux, the blue light is blocked which will help one in sleeping in time and keeping the eyes safe.
Capti Voice has a subscription based model and even the free version has a lot to offer from various file format supports to text search while the premium versions add features like creating playlists, OCR Support and intelligent dictionary lookup. The voices offered across all the platforms are very high quality and commendable.
Quick Tip: Don’t forget to use the Chrome extension which allows you to save articles or webpages to be read later by Capti Voice.
Best Speech To Text Software
Pros:
– Cross platform with mobile apps
– Create Playlists
– Dictionary lookup
– Shortcuts to get around
Starting with macOS Sierra and iOS 10, Apple has withdrawn support for one of the methods of implementing a virtual private networks (VPN), the point-to-point tunneling protocol (PPTP). Even though the protocol is still available in earlier versions of its mobile and desktop software, Apple has dropped support for PPTP for security reasons. VPN Tracker also supports PPTP it's not free but presumed to be the most professional VPN Software for the Mac. PPTP connections are automatically imported into VPN Tracker if launched on El Capitan prior to the upgrade and if the connection fails, there is a professional support team. Yes it's a paid product. Jan 19, 2018 How to setup an L2PT VPN on Mac OSX High Sierra. Use the link in this description for a Free Trial to setup a VPN or use the details provided by your VPN provider. Check out & Subscribe to our. Option 1: Install PrimoVPN, a light and affordable PPTP client for Mac. Option 2: Use VPN Tracker, a commercial macOS VPN client. Option 3: Select an alternative VPN protocol. For macOS 10.12 (Sierra), macOS 10.13 (High Sierra), and macOS 10.14 (Mojave): The PPTP VPN protocol was removed from the built-in VPN client. Update: For Mac OS X Catalina. For PPTP VPN on Mac OS X Catalina continue here. PPTP VPN is no longer supported on macOS Sierra and High Sierra and that is just fine, because there are some security issues.What is not fine that in corporate environment the inertia is so big, that this can take years to stop using PPTP VPN. So you have basically 4 options.
Cons:
– No standalone app
– Syncs only when you add to cloud storage
Verdict:
Overall, Capti Voice is a really compelling app with features packed to the brim and is very similar to natural Reader but with a subscription based model. It is really the best TTS experience you can get on Mac OS.
Pricing Info: Pricing Options for Capti Voice
Link: Download Capti Voice from here
6. Honorable Mentions
Text To Speech Software For Mac Os X El Capitan
CereProc has some of the most natural sounding computer speeches available on the market, which you can use to replace the default voice on your Mac (also available for other platforms). There are a lot of high quality voice packs to choose from and each costs around $35.
Text To Speech App Mac Os X
Zamzar is a free online service which you can use to convert your text to audio files or mp3s. Unlike the iTunes spoken track which you can use only on Apple devices, you can use it on any platform without any hassle.
Wrapping up: Best Text to Speech for Mac
So these were some of the TTS software available on the Mac and we hope we made your decision a little bit easier. If you are someone who reads mainly on the internet, Read Aloud is by far the best free option. Although a little limited, the built-in TTS feature seems to work just fine, but it can be a pain for long stretches of texts or long articles for which there is Invicta which is also free.
Natural Reader and Capti Voice both are spectacular TTS apps with a lot of plans to choose from, but I guess what it comes down to is the paying model. Natural reader is a one time purchase and should be better if you feel you will be invested in TTS for a long time whereas Capti Voice follows a subscription based model also with a one week free trial. Thanks for reading and do comment below which one is your favorite TTS app on Mac OS.
Read: Make your Devices Read Out Text, With Text to Speech