Readable Web
Readable Web is an “extension” for Chrome and Edge browsers. Also available for Safari MacOS.
Sensory Readable Web
Readable Web is a range of “extensions” for Chrome browser, Edge browser and Safari browser on MacOS. Readable Web will speak any accessible web page content by selecting the text with your mouse. You can also have the words underneath the mouse spoken, and can choose the “mouse hover” setting to speak a word, line or “block” which is normally a sentence. So if you need to have web content spoken aloud, the free Readable Web extensions could be perfect.
Readable Web extensions for Chrome and Edge include the novel underline highlighting technique for many natural sounding text to speech voices. We will either underline individual words as they are spoken, or underline the block of text. Readable Web extension for Safari MacOS also offers the underline highlighting on certain websites.
The Readable Web extension can use the text to speech voices available on your computer and also voices available through the web browser you are using. You will likely find a wide range of text to speech voices when on Windows, Chromebook or Mac, often with very high natural quality, in a wide range of languages.
Readable Web in Edge browser video
Readable Web in Chrome browser video
Readable Web in Safari MacOS video
Readable Web Voice Settings
Readable Web Settings provide different ways to trigger reading of content and options for text highlighting whilst reading. Clicking the settings button on the toolbar will display the settings panel shown.
Settings Descriptions
- Voice – Click the voice to display a list of available voices. Some voices will always be available, some voices may only be available when your computer is connected to the internet. The response of voices from the internet will depend on your local internet speed.
- Pitch – This slider can be used to change to pitch of the selected voice.
- Rate – Use this slider to change the speed of the selected voice.
- Volume – The volume of the selected voice can be adjusted using this slider.
- Silent mode – When ticked there is no speech or highlighting. This is useful if you wish to select some text and copy it to the clipboard without Readable Web reading the selection.
- Use Highlight – When ticked the text being spoken has a background colour and has the appearance of being selected.
- Underline – Hovering over the current colour displays a colour picker window that can be used to select a new colour for the text underlining.
- Use underline – When ticked the text being read will be underlined as reading progresses, if underlining is supported by the chosen voice. In Safari MacOS browser the underline is not available for some websites.
- Ctrl+Move to Speak –
Unticked – Simply hover over text to have it spoken automatically.
Ticked – Hover over the text you want to read and press and release the Ctrl key to start reading. - Help – Clicking this will take you to the online documentation for Readable Web.
- Close & Save – Clicking this will save your settings and close the settings window.
Manage or Remove Readable Web
Chrome
To remove the Readable Web extension in Chrome, right click your mouse on the Readable Web icon. This brings up the menu shown. You can remove the Extension from this menu.
Microsoft Edge
To remove the Readable Web extension in Edge, right click your mouse on the Readable Web icon. This brings up the menu shown. You can remove the Extension from this menu.
Safari MacOS
To remove the Readable Web extension in Safari on Mac, right click your mouse on the Readable Web icon. Click “Manage Extension” . This brings up the Extension settings shown.
Getting Help
To get further help, read the Readable Web help file pages or contact us by email at [email protected]