Speechify Review: Is It the Best AI Text-To-Speech App

Listening Experience

Speechify's cross-platform availability and syncing make listening to anything easy.

On your computer, you can listen via:

And on mobile, you have both Android and iOS apps (more on these later).

I will show you how Speechify text-to-speech feels on a web app and with the Chrome extension.

Speechify Web App

Inside Speechify's dashboard, start by uploading anything you want to read.

I will paste a link to one of the articles.

It takes a few seconds to import the link content and then opens up in this distraction-free Speechify editor.

Now, as simple as it may look on the surface, there is a lot you can do here.

Starting with, obviously, clicking on the play button and listening to the text.

Right off the bat, you'll notice that Speechify highlights the text as it's speaking it.

I find that to be a useful feature. It helps me stay concentrated on the subject and better retain what I learn.

Another cool feature is Ask AI. Speechify acts as a second brain for the document/web link you uploaded.

This means you can ask it anything you want to about that document.

For instance, I want five key takeaways from my text content:

It cuts the fluff and gives me exactly what I ask for. Because Speechify has all the context about your uploaded document, it does not hallucinate.

The details are accurate. Impressive!

You can keep going with back-and-forth conversations until you are done. It also remembers all the previous stuff.

And yes, you can listen to the AI-generated text too.

SIDENOTE: I can see one great use case for this feature. Students and Researchers can upload their research papers or academic content and chat with the documents. Time-saving feature.

If you want a fresh start with an AI conversation, hit the Clear chat icon, and you're good to go.

Next up, you have voices.

There are countless voices and languages to pick from. The voices sound conversational, engaging, and most important, human.

Besides voices, you can adjust the listening speed.

It can go from 0.5x (100 WPM) to 4.5x (900 WPM) which is quite versatile for various needs. There is also an option to increase speed on its own as the content progresses.

OPINION:

I tried listening at the maximum speed (900 words per minute).

The result?

I didn't understand a damn word. It was like listening to a really fast rap song without any music. For me, 2.5x (500 words per minute) is a sweet spot on the higher end.

Anything higher than that doesn't make sense.

Finally, we have extra (nice-to-have) features.

In the Display section, there are three:

In the Skip Content section, you can select everything you want the AI voice to skip in the content.

It can be:

If you want to share a specific document with someone, click on this link and share the link with anyone. They will be able to listen without having a Speechify account.

When you are working with PDFs on Speechify, great special options appear.

You can:

Speechify even allows you to download an MP3 version of your PDF so you can listen to your PDF even when offline.

NOTE: You can download up to 60 minutes of your PDF content. Moreover, celebrity voices are not available during download due to author rights.

Everything you upload in Speechify can be viewed in the dashboard.

You will also see the progress (what percent of file content you already listened to).

Meaning, you can save now and listen whenever you want to. It's kind of a 'save now, read or listen whenever' app functionality.

For organization, Speechify enables you to create folders and assign relevant documents inside folders.

Speechify succeeded in keeping its features simple yet useful.

Speechify Chrome Extension

First, install the Chrome extension by heading over to Settings > Apps.

After installing the extension, you'll be redirected to this page:

It shows all the places where you can listen to on Speechify in your browser. Close that page.

Now, you should see these floating Speechify buttons on the right side, on all the supported sites.

It will be enabled on every new page you open. You can disable it like this:

Now, let's say I have a Google Doc I want Speechify to read for me.

Head over to that doc and you'll see Speechify's icon at the right showing you how much time it would take it read the whole doc.

Hit play and it will start reading the doc.

You can do this for any website where text is present.

If you want Speechify to read a certain paragraph(s) in the middle of anywhere, hover over the first three words of that paragraph.

NOTE: This might not work on all websites.

Next, Speechify's Chrome Extension has all the features the web app has.

But it has something the web app does not: the ability to read a specific part of any page by taking its screenshot.

Press Esc to close the screenshot mode.

Not only that, with a click of a button, you can save any webpage inside your Speechify's dashboard.

Additionally, you can enable Dyslexic font and manage the font size. Again, these features might not work on all websites.

Finally, Speechify allows you to set some keyboard shortcuts for the Chrome extensions.

Wait, there's more.

Speechify's Chrome extension automatically enables special play buttons for social media sites, including but not limited to, Twitter:

And Reddit:

And how can we forget Speechify helping you achieve inbox zero by reading emails?

I love how Speechify ensures that you can access its features with them taking minimal space (with as little as just a play/pause button) on your screen.

It's brilliant.

By now, you can already imagine how you may integrate Speechify into your professional workflow to help you read, well, anything faster.

You may be procrastinating on that PDF book you wanted to read.

Or you may have a lot of pending emails you want to get over with.

Whatever it is, you now know how Speechify can help.