Text to speech for Chrome

Have any web page read aloud in Chrome

Last updated

Audhio reads the page you're on out loud, in a voice that sounds like a person. Each word lights up as it's read, so if your mind wanders, you can see where you are.

30 free minutes a month. No credit card.

First, the honest answer

Can Chrome read a page out loud?

Yes, it can now. Right-click a page, choose "Open in reading mode," and press play in the side panel. It's free and uses Google's natural voices, so try it.

The catch is that it reads a simplified copy in that side panel, not the page itself. Google also says it doesn't work on every site. It skips content inside embedded frames, which is how WGU course pages load their lessons, so it has nothing to read there.

Audhio reads right on the page you're looking at, frames included, and you can run it from the keyboard.

Three steps

How to have a web page read aloud

  1. 1

    Add Audhio to Chrome and sign in with Google.

  2. 2

    Open the page you want to hear. The Audhio player sits in the bottom right corner.

  3. 3

    Press play, or hit Space.

Want to start partway down? Click any word and it starts reading from there.

On the page

What Audhio does while it reads

Finds the part worth reading
It picks out the main text on the page, so you hear the article, not the menus.
Highlights each word
Your eyes and ears stay on the same word. If you drift for a sentence, the highlight shows you where to pick back up.
Goes at your speed
Anywhere from 0.75x to 3x. Speed up for skimming, slow down for the dense parts.
Works from the keyboard
Space to play and pause. Left and right arrows jump back or forward 5 seconds. Up and down change the speed.

Other options

How it compares to other read aloud tools

There are a lot of these, and some are free. Here's the honest version.

Chrome's own read aloud
Free and built in, with natural voices. It reads a simplified copy of the page in a side panel and skips embedded frames, so it can't read WGU course pages.
Edge's Read Aloud
Free and good, but only inside Microsoft Edge. Worth it if you already use Edge.
Read Aloud (extension)
Popular, with about 6 million users. The basic voices come from your browser and can sound robotic. The better AI voices cost extra or need your own account with a voice company.
Speechify
Polished voices and a phone app. Premium is $29 a month, or about $139 a year. Some users say its extension only reads part of a web page.

Audhio reads on the page itself, with natural voices, word highlighting and keyboard control. It also reads PDFs and Google Docs. It's free for 30 minutes a month, then $9.99 a month for unlimited. More on Audhio vs Speechify.

What it costs

30 minutes a month is free, with all four voices. If you need more, Pro is $9.99 a month or $99 a year, and you can listen as much as you want.

If money's tight, email lex@audhio.com and ask for Audhio Access. It's free Pro, and you don't have to prove anything.

Questions

Questions people ask

Is there a free text to speech Chrome extension?

Yes. Audhio is free for 30 minutes of listening every month, with all four voices, word highlighting, speed control and keyboard shortcuts. No credit card. You sign in with Google. If you need more, Pro is $9.99 a month or $99 a year.

Is Audhio a TTS extension?

Yes. TTS is short for text to speech. Audhio is a reading extension for Chrome: it reads the page out loud and highlights each word as it goes.

What can it read?

Most web pages: articles, blogs, course pages, documentation, news. It also reads PDFs and Google Docs you open in Chrome, and skips the clutter in PDFs like page numbers and citations. It doesn't read ebooks.

Does it work on my phone?

No. Audhio runs in Chrome on a computer.

Does it track what I read?

Audhio doesn't keep the text you read with your name on it. When you press play, the text goes to our server and to ElevenLabs, our voice provider, to make the audio. That audio and its text are saved for up to 90 days so the same text plays faster next time. They aren't linked to you. Audhio does log usage events, like when reading starts, with the address of the page you were on. Those events never include the text. Full details are at audhio.com/privacy.

From the blog

Reading help, if you want more

Try it on the next page you need to read.

Open the page, press play, and follow along.

Add to Chrome

30 free minutes every month. No credit card.