SpeechSynthesis.speak()

Experimental: This is an experimental technology
Check the Browser compatibility table carefully before using this in production.

The speak() method of the SpeechSynthesis interface adds an utterance to the utterance queue; it will be spoken when any other utterances queued before it have been spoken.

Syntax

speechSynthesisInstance.speak(utterance);

Returns

Void.

Parameters

utterance

A SpeechSynthesisUtterance object.

Examples

This snippet is excerpted from our Speech synthesiser demo. When a form containing the text we want to speak is submitted, we (amongst other things) create a new utterance containing this text, then speak it by passing it into speak() as a parameter.

var synth = window.speechSynthesis;

  ...

inputForm.onsubmit = function(event) {
  event.preventDefault();

  var utterThis = new SpeechSynthesisUtterance(inputTxt.value);
  var selectedOption = voiceSelect.selectedOptions[0].getAttribute('data-name');
  for(i = 0; i < voices.length ; i++) {
    if(voices[i].name === selectedOption) {
      utterThis.voice = voices[i];
    }
  }
  synth.speak(utterThis);
  inputTxt.blur();
}

Specifications

Browser compatibility

Desktop Mobile
Chrome Edge Firefox Internet Explorer Opera Safari WebView Android Chrome Android Firefox for Android Opera Android Safari on IOS Samsung Internet
speak
33
14
49
No
21
7
No
33
62
No
7
3.0

See also

© 2005–2021 MDN contributors.
Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License v2.5 or later.
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/SpeechSynthesis/speak