OS X El Capitan: Change your computer’s voice

Change your computer’s voice

You can change the voice your Mac uses to speak text in a window or an alert message.

Choose a voice

  1. Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Dictation & Speech, then click Text to Speech.

  2. Click the System Voice pop-up menu, then choose a voice.

  3. To adjust how fast the voice speaks, drag the Speaking Rate slider.

  4. Click Play to test the voice and speaking rate.

Add a new voice

You can add voices to the System Voice pop-up menu. If you add a voice that’s not on your Mac, it’s automatically downloaded from Apple.

  1. Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Dictation & Speech, then click Text to Speech.

  2. Click the System Voice pop-up menu, then choose Customize.

  3. Select the checkbox beside the voices you want to add.

    To find a voice, enter its name, country, or language in the search field.

    To sample a voice, select it, then click Play.

  4. Click OK.

  5. Click the System Voice pop-up menu, then choose the voice.

    The voice appears in the menu when the download is complete.

Delete a downloaded voice

You can delete a voice that you downloaded to your Mac.

  1. Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, click Dictation & Speech, then click Text to Speech.

  2. Click the System Voice pop-up menu, then choose Customize.

  3. Deselect the checkbox beside the voice you want to delete.

  4. Click OK, then click Delete.

Last Modified: Apr 13, 2016
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