The sixteenth generation of Apple’s iPhone is out and it's fully capable of providing its users with the text to speech feature. Let’s take a look.

Text to speech on iPhone 14

As of early October 2022, both versions of the new iPhone are out and like with all Apple devices (iPad Pro, AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch), people are going bonkers for them. Both the standard and Plus models are top-end smartphones, completely in a league of their own. No Android device can come close. Well, at least not in terms of brand attraction.

Besides 6 GB of RAM, 128-512 GB of internal storage, and the Apple A15 Bionic CPU, it offers a myriad of old and new features. One of them is, once again, text transcription. All written content on your display will be read aloud if you choose to do so. But how do you turn on this text to speech feature and is it that useful? Let’s find out.

How to enable text to speech on your iPhone 14

The current iOS 16.1 on both iPhone 14 models is an improvement on the previous iOS 15. This version of the operating system supports text to speech. All you have to do is go to Settings, then press Accessibility, and finally, Spoken Content. Afterward, you can select between several options, depending on which text you need to have read aloud.

Nevertheless, you can also install a third-party text to speech app on your iPhone. These tools will handle demanding TTS tasks and will do even more than the vanilla ones on your phone without the need of giving any permissions. One of the best ones available on the App Store is Speechify. We’ll discuss its capabilities later on in this text. 

How to use TTS on your iPhone 14

As mentioned, once you navigate your way to Spoken Content, you’ll get to choose between several options. All of these are useful and serve different users. So, let’s check each of them out and see what they offer, shall we?

1. Speak Selection: This option allows you to select text on your screen and have it read aloud by pressing the Speak button.
2. Speak Screen: By swiping down from the top of the screen with both your fingers, your iPhone will read aloud all the onscreen text—for example, notifications.
3. Speech Controller: By picking this option, you get to adjust the controller that’s on display when you want to engage with the text to speech feature.
4. Highlight Content: Selecting this option means that your iPhone 14 will highlight words, sentences, or both as it reads them aloud for you.
5. Typing Feedback: For those looking to have a voice-over while they type on their keyboard, the typing feedback option can even read emojis.
6. Voices: Since iOS devices offer several AI narrators, this option exists so that you can choose which one will provide you with the voice-over.
7. Speaking rate: You can also adjust the reading speed of the AI voice to be faster or slower, depending on your preferences.
8. Pronunciations: This is an advanced dictation option that allows you to set what kind of pronunciations your AI narrator will have.

How text to speech can help you with everyday tasks

Assistive technology

Text to speech technology is a game changer for so many people and so many lifestyles. Firstly, this is an assistive type of tech. What this means is that it’s mostly focused on helping people with various reading difficulties consume written content like all others. These include dyslexics, people with ADHD, impaired vision, and brain injuries.

Multitasking

However, text to speech tech isn’t solely focused on them. It’s also quite useful for average folks as they listen to their iPhones read their e-mails aloud to them while they attend to other chores. They cook, clean, or do the laundry, all while listening to the content of their inbox. But there are other benefits of using this accessibility feature on your new iPhone.

Language learning

Turning on the read-aloud option is also quite useful for students. Namely, with it, you can turn any study material on your phone into audio files. And by using an app like Speechify, you can also listen to the text on your screen in other languages, which is more than useful if you’re looking to learn them.

How to use text to speech with apps like Safari

Apple’s very own web browser is Safari. It’s a fast and reliable program that surfs the internet just like all other popular options like Mozilla or Google Chrome. Nevertheless, it’s also possible to use text to speech technology on it to listen instead of read the web pages that Safari is showing you. Of course, with apps like Speechify.

Speechify is available as a plug-in for Safari and you can add it to your browser by going to the extension store. It’s simple. Just type Speechify, and it will pop up and ask you to add it to your browser. You can do this too on your macOS MacBook or desktop and iPadOS tablet. The process is the same. Just add it as a plug-in.

The different voices you can choose from

The best part of text to speech apps is that you can never get bored using them. This is thanks to the number of different voices, accents, and languages they work in. Unlike Siri on iPhone, Speechify offers over 30 natural-sounding voices that speak over 15 languages. From Spanish to Italian to Mandarin, you can listen to your content in practically any accent.

When it comes to the voices themselves, all languages have both male and female versions. Moreover, they have different accents. If we take English, for instance, you can listen to it in an American, British, or even Indian accent. All this makes using text to speech apps even more appealing, as each new listen is a different experience.

Make the most out of your TTS iPhone 14 experience with Speechify

Speechify is the perfect solution for anyone looking for more out of text to speech technology. Besides offering numerous AI narrators that work in various languages, it has a special feature that sets it apart from other TTS apps. Its optical character recognition tool allows you to snap photos of text and the app will understand and read it aloud.

All this makes Speechify the number-one-rated text to speech app on the App Store. With thousands of downloads and satisfied users, it’s the only real way to turn any text into an audio file or your personal podcast. All you have to do is go to the App Store and type Speechify into it to download and enjoy the app on your brand-new iPhone 14.

FAQ

Does the iPhone 13 have talk to text?

Yes, iPhone 13 has this feature, and it’s called speech to text. To activate it, go to the Settings app and then Accessibility.

What is the difference between voice-over and talk to text?

A voice-over is a prerecorded narration of a certain script. On the other hand, talk to text is a term that refers to speech to text technology, which turns spoken words into digital text on your smartphone or computer.