The internet is full of articles you want to read and learn. However, reading through lengthy web pages can be time-consuming and challenging, especially for those with visual impairments or busy schedules. Fortunately, you can convert any web page text to speech and read it aloud. For instance, you can catch up on the latest news while getting ready in the morning, listen to your favorite blog posts during your daily commute, or even have web articles read aloud while you work on other tasks. To put it simply, the use cases for listening to web pages are endless.
In this tutorial, let me show you how to use text-to-speech to read web pages aloud in Chrome and Edge browsers.
Listen to web pages (text-to-speech)
To listen or read aloud a web page by converting its text-to-speech, follow the steps below. The steps shown will work in Chrome and Edge browsers.
Step 1: Launch the web browser of your choice.
First, open the web browser of your choice by searching for it in the Start menu or clicking on the relevant taskbar icon. You can either use Edge or Chrome. In my case, I’m using Chrome.
Step 2: Install the Text Reader extension.
After launching the browser, go to the link given below and click on the Add to Chrome button and then click on Add extension button. On Edge, you must click Get > Add extension. This action will install the extension in Chrome/Edge.
Once the extension is installed, it will not be visible next to the address bar. To make it visible, click the Extensions icon and click on the Pin icon next to the extension name. On Edge, you must click on the little Eye icon. This action pins the extension next to the address bar so that you can access it quickly.
Step 3: Open the web page and click on the extension icon.
Once the extension is installed in Chrome/Edge, open the web page you want to read aloud (listen). Once the web page loads, click on the extension icon to launch the extension.
Step 4: Click the play button to listen to the web page.
Now, click the Play button in the extension UI. This will convert the web pages text-to-speech and reads aloud.
You can click on specific parts of the extracted text to quickly move to that section.
Step 5: (Optional) Change the text-to-speech voice.
By default, the extension uses the built-in Windows Narrator voice to read the web page aloud. If you don’t like the default voice, you can change the text-to-speech voice by clicking the top dropdown menu and selecting the voice of your choice. For instance, you can use Google TTS for a natural voice.
If you want to further customize the extension’s behavior, click the Settings (gear) icon at the top. Here, you can customize things like the background and text highlight color, hotkeys, theme, popup position, and more.
That is it. It is that simple to listen to web pages using TTS (text-to-speech).
I hope this little tutorial helped you read web pages aloud improving accessibility and productivity.
If you are stuck or need help, send an email, and I will try to help as much as possible.