Quick Speak & Speak Selection

Quick Speak: type it, hear it

Press ⌃⌥S anywhere on your Mac. A small glass panel opens near the top of the screen, like Spotlight.

• Type, then press Return to hear it. Shift-Return adds a new line.
• ↑ / ↓ bring back phrases you spoke earlier in this session.
• Esc stops playback. Press it again to close the panel. Clicking elsewhere also closes it, and audio keeps playing.
• Pick a voice from the menu at the bottom-left. Your choice is remembered, and it's the same “quick voice” as in Settings → General.
• Replay plays the last result again. Open in Studio moves the text into Studio for fine-tuning.

Everything you speak is saved in History. Quick Speak is also in the menu-bar icon's menu and under View → Quick Speak.

Speak Selection: read anything aloud

Select text in any app, such as a web page, an email or a PDF, and press ⌃⌥R. VoxStudio copies the selection, puts your clipboard back the way it was, and reads the text in the Quick Speak panel. Press Esc to stop.

Speak Selection needs the same Accessibility permission as dictation: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Accessibility → VoxStudio. Without it, the panel tells you what to enable.

Change the shortcuts

Settings → Shortcuts lets you record new shortcuts for Quick Speak, Speak Selection and Dictation. Each needs at least one modifier key (⌘ ⌥ ⌃ ⇧).