A sentence can look perfectly normal on the page and still sound wrong when you hear it. You notice the repeated word. The sentence that runs too long. The paragraph that sounded clear in your head but becomes difficult to follow once somebody actually has to say it.
Writers have used this method for a long time because your ears catch things your eyes learn to skip over.
The problem is that reading an entire manuscript aloud is also tedious.
So we built the Read-Aloud Proofreader.
Open your draft and listen
The tool lets you open a PDF, Word document, text file, or Markdown file directly in your browser.
Once the document is open, press play and it begins reading your work back to you. The sentence currently being spoken is highlighted in the document, so you can follow the text while you listen.
If something sounds wrong, you know exactly where it is.
You can also click any sentence to begin playback from that point. If you are revising one troublesome paragraph, you do not need to start the document over every time.
Your document stays on your computer
We wanted this to work with drafts that people might not want to upload somewhere.
Your document is never uploaded to our server.
PDFs are opened in the browser with pdf.js. Word documents are opened with mammoth.js. The document itself remains on your device.
Only the text of the passage being narrated is briefly sent out to generate its audio.
That means you can proofread a manuscript, essay, article, research paper, or unfinished draft without first handing the whole file to another service.
The same voices as the rest of the site
The proofreader uses the same Ryan and Bella narrator voices already used throughout Theologians Press for Scripture and the Church Fathers.
Your narrator and playback-speed preference are shared across the site too.
If you have already chosen the voice you prefer while reading the Fathers or listening to Scripture, you do not have to configure everything again when you open the proofreader.
Following the sentence as it is spoken
The sentence highlighting uses the same system we built for read-aloud commentary in the Fathers Library.
The narration service does not give us exact word-by-word timing. Instead, the reader looks at the actual length of the generated audio and the punctuation of the sentence, then estimates where the narration should be as the clip plays.
The highlight is painted over the displayed document. It does not rewrite or alter the document itself.
It is a small detail, but it makes a large difference when proofreading. You can listen with your ears while keeping your eyes anchored to the exact place in the manuscript.
Proofreading by ear
Reading aloud is especially useful because writing and speaking expose different problems.
When we reread something we wrote, we already know what we intended to say. Our eyes can glide over missing words, strange rhythms, repetitions, and sentences that ask too much of the reader.
Hearing the same passage forces it to unfold at an ordinary human pace.
If you stumble while listening to a sentence, there is a good chance a reader will stumble over it too.
The Read-Aloud Proofreader does not try to edit the manuscript for you. It gives you another way to encounter your own writing before somebody else does.
That is the point.
Can I have a PDF or Word document read aloud for free?
Yes. Open the Read-Aloud Proofreader, drop in a PDF, Word document, text file, or Markdown file, and press play. There is no account, no sign up, and no cost.
Because it runs entirely in your browser, it can read a manuscript, an essay, a research paper, or a school assignment back to you the same way, without asking you to upload it anywhere first.
You can try the Read-Aloud Proofreader now, or find it alongside the File Converter in our Writing Tools.