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Why has windows Word changed to a robotic voice in read aloud? When is a more human voice to be returned. As an author, my work sounds awful.
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I have exactly the same issue and I have checked with other users who report the same problem. I believe it's caused by a recent update to Office 365, but only business users can ring Support now so I have no idea how to proceed. It's a valuable feature I used to use a lot to listen to my own writing.
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I have the same issue. I also believe it's a bug introduced by Office 365.
Go to the help tab, use the feedback button - and make a report - the more users that do this, the quicker the issue will be resolved. Also contact support, make a fuss. It's at least the thrid time the developers have caused this bug.
I was sick of this problem and contacted MS Tech support on their chat site. The result was they came in and took over my computer remotely and removed Office & word, then reloaded it and installed an English human voice. It now sounds perfect. Job Done.
That's encouraging. How did you contact/find MS Tech support chat? I haven't been able to find a way as a home rather than a business user.
Search MS Support, Then fill in what your problem is with i.e Word /Office 365/ Home. Then click to Tech support / Then go and type in your problem with word to the chat robot, and then ask to speak to an agent. You wait a couple of minutes, and a human comes on and asks what he can help with. Explain the problem and play dumb. Ask him to come in and remotely sort the problem out, as it is beyond you. Job done. Good luck.
Try This link. It is very overloaded, and you may be timed out. Have patience
Julian Nicholson. I fully understand your frustration, as I am an author and this facility is so useful to listen then amend the written word. I had to try all ways to finally reach a human who sorted the problem. Good luck. Let me know how you get on. ******@aol.com
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Just adding to the thread that I'm having the same issue. It also happened before several months ago and sorted itself out eventually but it's happening again and it's really quite annoying. I'm a copywriter so I use the read aloud feature constantly but now everything sounds awful.
Search MS Technical Support - then click on Office 365 - then click on chat - then ask for an agent - Then ASK FOR A REMOTE ASSISTANCE AGENT, and the problem can be solved I did it twice as a BIOS update reverted it back to a robot, all is well now, and I have my human back. As an author, I fully understand your needs and this does work!
This seems to a general fault resulting from a recent Office 365 update. I have the same problem, as do others I know. I tried it this morning on a laptop with an older version of office (because I had not connected it to the internet for a couple of months) and it worked fine, so the issue is related to a recent update. I am guessing it will stop working on the laptop if I leave it on. Both systems are running Windows 10.
If you save a Word document as a web page you can open it in Edge and read it aloud using the natural sounding voices you are used to. I have tried it and it works. It's a workaround and we just have to hope Microsoft will one day fix the problem.
Okay, Edge's read aloud not as good as the proper read aloud feature in Word which is capable of realistic and sensitive reading of a piece of writing. Edge is a little clunky and not totally naturalistic. I guess it doesn't have the same processing power. What I'm really unhappy about is not being able to speak to a Microsoft agent about it unless I'm a 'business' customer. Office 365 has a very substantial subscription price tag now!
Why can we not use the human sounding voice that is listed in "Narrator" into Word. I see "Ryan" is Human in Narrator, but I cannot copy it to a word read aloud speaker. Can anyone help, or is this impossible in windows 11?
I am sure the problem is related to the roll out of copilot. A google search produced this AI generated response "To use Read Aloud with Microsoft Copilot in Word, use the feature integrated into the Microsoft Edge browser as a workaround, as the original Copilot feature is no longer present." If you save a Word document as a web page you can open it in Edge and read it aloud using the natural sounding voices you are used to. I have tried it and it works - but I'm unimpressed I am paying very much more for Office because of copilot (which I don't use), can no longer contact Support, and a feature I used all the time no longer works.
On the link below they provide a method to change the voice used for Read Aloud in Word, try using those steps.
Did you try using the feature yourself before answering?
