Listen to your Word documents

There are many reasons to listen to a document, such as proofreading, multitasking, or increased comprehension and learning. Word makes listening possible by using the text-to-speech (TTS) ability of your device to play back written text as spoken words.

There are multiple tools for listening to your Word documents:

• Read Aloud reads all or part of your document. You can use Read Aloud on its own or within Immersive Reader for Word in Windows and MacOS.
• Immersive Reader is a set of tools that help improve reading fluency and comprehension. For more information about Immersive Reader, see Learning Tools in Word.
• Speak reads only the text you've selected. Speak is available for Windows only. For more information about Speak, see Use the Speak text-to-speech feature to read text aloud.
• Narrator is the Windows Screen reader app that reads your dialog boxes, buttons, and other user interfaces as well as the text. For more information about Narrator, see Using Windows Narrator in Office for the web.
• Speech is a built-in accessibility feature of MacOS. When you set up Speech preferences in your Mac system preferences, you can select text and have it read by pressing a keyboard combination you’ve defined.

Note: For the full list of supported languages, see Language and voice support for the Speech service.

Listen with Read Aloud

Read Aloud is only available for Office 2019, Office 2021, and Microsoft 365.

1. On the Review tab, select Read Aloud.

Change Read Aloud settings

1. Select the gear icon in the controls at the top right.

Keyboard shortcuts

You can easily control Read Aloud using the following keyboard shortcuts in Windows:

CTRL + Alt + Space

Start Read Aloud

Play or pause Read Aloud

CTRL + Left Arrow

Skip to start of current paragraph

CTRL + Left Arrow + Left Arrow

Skip to start of previous paragraph

CTRL + Right Arrow

Skip forward to start of next paragraph

Alt + Left Arrow

Decrease reading speed

Alt + Right Arrow

Increase reading speed

Listen to your documents with Speak

Speak is a built-in feature of Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, and OneNote. Speak reads aloud only the text you select. Read Aloud reads the entire document starting from your cursor location like an audiobook.

1. Select a word or block of text in your document.
2. In the Quick Access Toolbar, select the Speak selected text icon.

Tip: For instructions about how to add the Speak icon to your Quick Access Toolbar, see the help article Use the Speak text-to-speech feature to read text aloud.

Supported languages

Read Aloud uses the proofing language set for the document. To change the language, see the help article Fix text-to-speech reading in wrong language.

Voices

Depending on your platform, text-to-speech (TTS) uses software that comes built into your device or through a Microsoft service. The voices available will differ between TTS services. If you’re using Immersive Reader, see the help article Download voices for Immersive Reader, Read Mode, and Read Aloud for more information.

Our team is working on making voices sound more natural, so keep looking for improvements.

Troubleshooting

If you don’t see Read Aloud available, make sure that you’re signed into your Microsoft 365 account, and then try restarting the Word app or logging out and back in.

If you are unable to access Neural Voices, make sure you have a stable internet connection and are signed into your Microsoft 365 account.

Privacy

Read Aloud doesn’t store your content or audio data. Microsoft uses your content only to provide you with audio results. For more information about experiences that analyze your content, see Connected Experiences in Office.

In MacOS you can listen to documents using Read Aloud or Speech.

Listen with Read Aloud for MacOS

Read Aloud is only available for Office 2019, Office 2021, and Microsoft 365.

1. On the Review tab, select Read Aloud.

Change Read Aloud settings

1. Select the gear icon in the controls to open the settings.

Keyboard shortcuts

You can easily control Read Aloud using the following keyboard shortcuts in MacOS:

CTRL + Option + Space

Start Read Aloud

Play or pause Read Aloud

Option + up arrow

Skip to start of previous paragraph

Option + down arrow

Skip forward to start of next paragraph

Listen to your documents with Speech

Speech is a built-in accessibility feature of MacOS. After you activate Speech for your Mac, you can select text and have it read by pressing a keyboard combination you’ve defined.

To activate Speech, do the following:

1. On the Apple menu, select System Preferences.
2. In the System Preferences window, select Accessibility.

Supported languages

Read Aloud uses the proofing language set for the document. To change the language, see the help article Fix text-to-speech reading in wrong language.

Voices

Depending on your platform, text-to-speech (TTS) uses software that comes built into your device or by a Microsoft service. The voices available will differ between TTS services. If you’re using Immersive Reader, see the help article Download voices for Immersive Reader, Read Mode, and Read Aloud for more information.

Our team is working on making voices sound more natural, so keep looking for improvements.

Troubleshooting

If you don’t see Read Aloud available, make sure that you’re signed in to your Microsoft 365 account, and then try restarting the Word app or logging out and back in.

If you are unable to access neural voices, please make sure you have a stable internet connections and are signed in to your Microsoft 365 account.

Privacy

Read Aloud doesn’t store your content or audio data. Microsoft uses your content only to provide you with audio results. For more information about experiences that analyze your content, see Connected Experiences in Office.

In Word for the Web, you can listen to your documents using Immersive Reader.

Using Immersive Reader

1. On the View tab, go to Document Views and select Immersive Reader.

Change Immersive Reader settings

You can change the voice speed and selection for Immersive Reader.

Select the gear icon at the bottom to open Voice Settings.

Voices

Depending on your platform, text-to-speech (TTS) uses software that comes built into your device or through a Microsoft service. The voices available will differ between TTS services. If you’re using Immersive Reader, see the help article Download voices for Immersive Reader, Read Mode, and Read Aloud for more information.

Our team is working on making voices sound more natural, so keep looking for improvements.

Troubleshooting

If you don’t see Read Aloud available, make sure that you’re signed in to your Microsoft 365 account, and then try restarting the Word app or logging out and back in.

Privacy

Read Aloud doesn’t store your content or audio data. Microsoft uses your content only to provide you with audio results. For more information about experiences that analyze your content, see Connected Experiences in Office.

Listen with Read Aloud in Word for iPad

1. Tap the menu icon at the top.
2. Tap Read Aloud.

Change Read Aloud settings for iPad

1. In the Read Aloud controls, tap the gear icon.
2. Use the slider to increase or decrease the reading speed.

Listen with Read Aloud in Word for iPhone

1. Tap the pen icon at the top to open the ribbon.

Change Read Aloud settings for iPhone

1. To change the speech rate, in the Read Aloud controls, tap the gear icon.
2. Under Audio Settings, user the Speech Rate Slider to increase or decrease the reading speed.

Supported languages

When you’re online, Read Aloud tries to detect the language of the text and can support multiple languages in a single document. For the full list of supported languages, see the help article Language and voice support for the Speech service.

Voices

Depending on your platform, text-to-speech (TTS) uses software that comes built into your device or through a Microsoft service. The voices available will differ between TTS services. If you’re using Immersive Reader, see the help article Download voices for Immersive Reader, Read Mode, and Read Aloud for more information.

Our team is working on making voices sound more natural, so keep looking for improvements.

Troubleshooting

If you don’t see Read Aloud available, make sure that you’re signed in to your Microsoft 365 account, and then try restarting the Word app or logging out and back in.

Privacy

Read Aloud doesn’t store your content or audio data. Microsoft uses your content only to provide you with audio results. For more information about experiences that analyze your content, see Connected Experiences in Office.

Listen with Read Aloud in Word for Android phone

1. At the top, tap the menu icon.
2. Tap Read Aloud.

Change Read Aloud settings for Android phone

1. To change the speech rate, in the Read Aloud controls, tap the gear icon.
2. Under Audio Settings, adjust the Speech Rate Slider to increase or decrease the reading speed.

Supported languages

For the full list of supported languages, see the help article Language and voice support for the Speech service.

Voices

Depending on your platform, text-to-speech (TTS) uses software that comes built into your device or through a Microsoft service. The voices available will differ between TTS services. If you’re using Immersive Reader, see the help article Download voices for Immersive Reader, Read Mode, and Read Aloud for more information.

Our team is working on making voices sound more natural, so keep looking for improvements.

Troubleshooting

If you don’t see Read Aloud available, make sure that you’re signed in to your Microsoft 365 account, and then try restarting the Word app or logging out and back in.

Privacy

Read Aloud doesn’t store your content or audio data. Microsoft uses your content only to provide you with audio results. For more information about experiences that analyze your content, see Connected Experiences in Office.