Questions

How to make a Mac read text aloud

Every Mac can read text aloud with no extra app. Switch on Speak selection in System Settings, Accessibility, Spoken Content, select some text, and press Option Esc. Press Option Esc again to stop. If that key combination is hard for you, the same feature can sit on a mouse button, a controller, a switch, or a knock on a MacBook.

Steps

1. Switch on Speak selection in System Settings, Accessibility, Spoken Content.
2. Select text.
3. Press Option Esc, or a button bound to Speak Selection in InputConfig.

Set it up

1. Open System Settings, then Accessibility, then Spoken Content.
2. Switch on Speak selection.
3. Choose a System voice and a Speaking rate on the same page. Better voices can be downloaded from the voice menu.
4. Select text in any app and press Option Esc.

You can change the shortcut with the info button next to Speak selection on the same page.

Option Esc is not Force Quit

Force Quit is Command Option Esc. Speak selection is Option Esc on its own, without Command. If a Force Quit window opens instead of speech, Command was held.

Read aloud from a button instead of the keyboard

Option Esc needs two keys at once in the top corner of the keyboard. For one hand, a tremor, or no keyboard at all, InputConfig can press it for you:

1. Install InputConfig from the Mac App Store and allow Accessibility access.
2. Add a row, press Scan, and press the button: a mouse side button, a controller button, a switch, a MIDI pad, or a key nothing uses.
3. Set the output to System Function, then Accessibility, Speak Selection.
4. Activate. Select text, press the button to hear it, press it again to stop.

To hear a whole page or document without selecting by hand, make the row a macro: Command A, then Speak Selection.

InputConfig is free on the Mac App Store. macOS 14 or later, no account, no tracking, open source.

If nothing is spoken

• Check Speak selection is switched on in Spoken Content.
• Check some text is selected, and that it is real text: a scanned PDF or a picture of text has nothing to select.
• Check the Mac's volume and output device.
• InputConfig's Speak Selection output always sends Option Esc. If you changed the macOS shortcut, change it back or bind your new combination as a key output instead.

Two features with similar names

InputConfig also has spoken feedback, which says a phrase you choose when a button fires, useful for learning a layout by ear. That is InputConfig speaking, not the Mac reading your text. For a screen reader that describes everything on screen, the Mac has VoiceOver, and the VoiceOver navigation layout drives it from a controller.

Questions

Related

• Dictation, zoom, and speak selection on any button
• Spoken feedback
• Drive VoiceOver from a game controller
• Accessibility
• How to use mouse side buttons on a Mac

Free. macOS 14 or later. No account, nothing leaves your Mac. Open source on GitHub.