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These guides are about listening to text instead of reading it on a screen. Most start from a file you already have, such as a PDF, an EPUB or MOBI ebook, a Word document or a plain text file, and show how to have it read aloud on an iPhone or iPad. The format guides take one file type at a time, starting with how to listen to a PDF on iPhone and how to listen to EPUB books. The how-to posts cover listening in the car, on a plane without a connection, and without touching the screen.

The roundups and comparisons look at other text-to-speech apps, among them Speechify, NaturalReader, ElevenReader, Voice Dream, Audible, Apple Books and the iPhone's own Spoken Content. A good place to start is the best text-to-speech apps for iPhone. We make SpeakCove, so read these posts with that in mind. How we review explains where our facts come from and how we treat our own app.

The use-case guides are written for particular readers: students, writers proofreading a draft, language learners, lawyers, commuters, and people with dyslexia, ADHD or a visual impairment. The reading guides list public-domain books and well-known research papers to listen to, from Shakespeare and classic science fiction to the original deep learning papers.

To try any of this without installing anything, open the free web reader: paste text or open a file, and it reads it aloud in your browser. The SpeakCove app for iPhone and iPad keeps your files in a library, reads them offline and works with CarPlay, for a one-time price instead of a subscription.