Google’s TTS or Text To Speech service, which comes inbuilt in Android, is now available as a standalone Google Play app downloadable on any Android device. This sentence may appear self-contradictory, after all, if the device comes with Android, why download it ? Well, this is not so contradictory because a number of smartphone manufacturers don’t bother to include it. Some, like Samsung, provide their own TTS Engine, with no option of replacement by another engine. Now most users aren’t very fond of the mechanical Samsung engine, and they can now download the Google TTS and run it, thereby overriding the existing TTS engine.
In terms of benefits, Google TTS offers you a more natural female voice, unlike the robotic one of other engines. Further, one can modify the rate of speech. The number of languages is still restricted, even in this new form though, and we hope that Google seriously considers expanding them soon. As such, there isn’t much that is new in the update itself, and those who already have TTS can afford to give it a miss.
To enable TTS, one simply has to head over to Settings. Open the accessibility Tab, and if you’re on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and above, there should be an option for TTS settings. Head in, and chooose Google Text-To-Speech. You can tap the settings icon beside it to customize it further.