# Text to speech for deaf and hard of hearing people

Updated 2026-10-31

Many deaf and hard of hearing people communicate in sign language, by writing, with captions or with their own voice, and choose what suits each situation. Text to speech adds one more option: you type, and your phone says it out loud, to a person in front of you or to someone on a call. Captions do the opposite and turn the other person’s speech into text.

This guide sums up the type-to-speak tools built into phones, from Apple’s and Google’s own help pages, and shows how to prepare everyday phrases as audio in a voice you like.

## Live Speech on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch

Apple’s Live Speech is turned on in Settings, Accessibility, Live Speech. On iPhone and iPad you open it by triple-clicking the side button, or through the Accessibility Shortcut; on a Mac it lives in the menu bar. What you type is spoken from your device in person, and in phone and FaceTime calls the other people hear it on their side. You can save Favorite Phrases, choose a system voice or a Personal Voice you made, and on iPhone and iPad adjust pitch and speed. Apple lists iOS 17 or later and iPhone XS or later.

## Live Transcribe on Android

Google’s Live Transcribe shows speech and sounds around you as text on the screen. To answer, tap Type, write your message and tap Read aloud to play it through the phone’s speaker. On Android 12 or later you can download several languages for offline use.

## Ready-made phrases as audio

For situations you meet often, such as ordering, a doctor’s reception, introducing yourself or asking someone to type, keep a few phrases as audio files and play them with one tap. Hear voices free on their pages with a phrase of 30 to 100 characters and download the recording, or make a whole set offline with the free engine: superclonica --text "Hi, I am deaf. Please type on my phone or speak slowly." --voice voice.json --lang en --output hello.mp3. You can also train a voice of your own in the studio from a 5 to 10 second recording.

## Tips for typing to speak

Short sentences sound clearer than long ones. Put the most important words first, and spell names the way they are pronounced if the voice reads them wrongly. In a loud place, hold the phone closer to the listener or show the screen as well.

## Your choice comes first

Text to speech does not replace sign language, interpreters, relay services or captions; it is one more tool you can pick when it suits you. If you work with people who are deaf, ask them how they prefer to communicate rather than assuming.

## More guides

- [Apple Books read aloud: let your iPhone or Mac read to you](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/apple-books-read-aloud)
- [Text to speech for mute and nonverbal people](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/text-to-speech-for-nonverbal-people)
- [Voicemod alternative: type instead of talk](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/voicemod-alternative)
- [iMovie text to speech: how to add an AI voiceover](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/imovie-text-to-speech)
- [Safari read aloud: listen to web pages on iPhone, iPad and Mac](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/safari-read-aloud)
- [Name ringtone maker: talking ringtones in AI voices](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/name-ringtone-maker)
- [Custom Siri voice: what works on iPhone](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/custom-siri-voice)
- [How to turn off the voice guide on a TV](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/tv-voice-guide-off)
- [Alarm voice generator: wake up to any voice](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/alarm-voice-generator)
- [Robot vacuum voice pack: give your vacuum a new voice](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/robot-vacuum-voice-pack)
- [Voice banking: how to save your own voice](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/voice-banking)
- [Text to speech for blind and visually impaired people](https://superclonica.com/en/guides/text-to-speech-for-blind-people)

## Text to speech and comparisons

- [Text-to-speech that runs on your own computer](https://superclonica.com/en/text-to-speech)
- [Supertonic vs SuperClonica: same model, faster and cleaner](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/supertonic)
- [Fish Audio and Fish Speech vs SuperClonica](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/fish-audio)
- [OmniVoice vs SuperClonica: more languages or more speed](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/omnivoice)
- [Qwen3-TTS vs SuperClonica for local text-to-speech](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/qwen3-tts)
- [VoxCPM 2 vs SuperClonica: studio sound or CPU speed](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/voxcpm)
- [F5-TTS vs SuperClonica: zero-shot cloning or fast CPU speech](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/f5-tts)
- [An offline alternative to ElevenLabs](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/elevenlabs)
- [Kokoro TTS vs SuperClonica: two small models for local speech](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/kokoro)
- [Piper TTS vs SuperClonica: tiny devices or custom voices](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/piper)
- [Coqui XTTS-v2 vs SuperClonica: a Coqui TTS alternative](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/xtts)
- [Chatterbox TTS vs SuperClonica: instant cloning or a trained voice file](https://superclonica.com/en/compare/chatterbox)

## Frequently asked questions

### Can deaf people use text to speech in phone calls?

Yes. With Apple Live Speech, the other people in a phone or FaceTime call hear what you type.

### Is there type-to-speak on Android?

Live Transcribe shows speech as text and lets you tap Type, write a reply and tap Read aloud to play it through the phone speaker.

### Can I choose the voice?

Live Speech offers system voices and a Personal Voice you create. For ready-made audio phrases, any catalog voice or your own trained voice works.

### Is it free?

Live Speech and Live Transcribe are built into the phones. The SuperClonica engine is free and runs offline.

- [Browse voices](https://superclonica.com/en/explore)
- [Install the free engine](https://superclonica.com/en/superclonica)

## Sources

- [Apple: Use Live Speech](https://support.apple.com/en-us/105018)
- [Google: Use Live Transcribe](https://support.google.com/accessibility/android/answer/9158064)
- [SuperClonica engine on PyPI](https://pypi.org/project/superclonica-cpu/)
- [SuperClonica](https://superclonica.com/en/)
- [AI voice catalog for text to speech](https://superclonica.com/en/explore)
- [Text to Speech API: free key, plans from $5](https://superclonica.com/en/speech-api)
- [Custom voice commissions for Supertonic 3](https://superclonica.com/en/requests)
- [How it works: voices, local speech, training](https://superclonica.com/en/guide)
- [Install the faster Supertonic 3 engine](https://superclonica.com/en/superclonica)
- [About us: speech synthesis enthusiasts](https://superclonica.com/en/about)
- [Contacts, support and voice complaints](https://superclonica.com/en/contacts)
- [Privacy policy: what data we keep](https://superclonica.com/en/privacy)
- [Terms of use: rules for buyers and authors](https://superclonica.com/en/terms)
- [Text to speech](https://superclonica.com/en/text-to-speech)