Thread

Gemini 3.8 text-to-speech

330 points · 152 comments · swolpers

seemaze · 1790182683 · focus · HN ↗
My primary use case for TTS is converting written content (blogs, articles, etc.) in to clips I can listen to on the go.
Is there a good browser extension that does this with a flexible TTS backend? I know Qwen, Kokoro, and VibeVoice all have decent quality..
1. kyrra · 1790182767 · focus · HN ↗
  If you use Chrome on Android, there is a "Listen to this page" option in the menu.
  <a href="https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/14768725?hl=en" rel="nofollow">https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/14768725?hl=en
  1. e12e · 1790195351 · focus · HN ↗
    Doesn't actually read the page, though. Or not what you see in the browser. For example right now, when I navigate to "reply" it doesn't read the comment I'm replying to - it's reading the login banner you get visiting a reply link without being logged in.
2. janalsncm · 1790185116 · focus · HN ↗
  For on the go, I’ve been using ElevenReader. Technically not free but their free tier has been plenty for me.
3. unglaublich · 1790185572 · focus · HN ↗
  I vibed a wikipodcast app that has a wikipedia dump, gemma llm for search and summarization and a tts model for audio gen so I could just ask about topics while on the go, and the app would just go off and tell me stuff out of the Wikipedia database.
  It was especially nice during a bike trip along the Rhine, I listened to a lot of the history of the industrial area and its cities.
  1. le-mark · 1790250245 · focus · HN ↗
    That’s really great; an ad hoc tour guide!
4. exhilaration · 1790192497 · focus · HN ↗
  Browser extension? Try these: <a href="http://www.paper2audio.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.paper2audio.com/ <a href="https://freevoicereader.com/" rel="nofollow">https://freevoicereader.com/ <a href="https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/sza-text-to-speech/jfaocnefnpgpdmfodmpcmlmfllicbpbi?pli=1" rel="nofollow">https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/sza-text-to-speech/... <a href="https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/flow-tts/hknidankihadgkfhohimfmfiamdeiedb" rel="nofollow">https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/flow-tts/hknidankih...
  I found all these on this subreddit: <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/TextToSpeech/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/TextToSpeech/
  I've also see comments like "Microsoft Edge's read-aloud feature is amazing for TTS" but I haven't tried it myself.
  Personally I use Kokoro with a python front-end on my Macbook, I linked to it in this comment: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49818923">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49818923 it outputs MP3, so I just copy those to my phone and listen as audiobooks.
  1. goldenjm · 1790204347 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm the Paper2Audio founder. I hope you enjoy using us for text to speech. Our browser extension adds your open tabs to your listening queue.
    Please let me know if you have any questions or feedback.
5. jonifico · 1790220379 · focus · HN ↗
  Edge has a built-in function to read websites.
6. naimkabir · 1790657397 · focus · HN ↗
  Yep, <a href="https://webpod.ai" rel="nofollow">https://webpod.ai
  It sends it to your Spotify playlist so you can listen in the same place as the rest of your podcasts etc

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