NAME

       espeak-ng - A multi-lingual software speech synthesizer.

SYNOPSIS

       espeak-ng [options] [words]

DESCRIPTION

       espeak-ng is a software speech synthesizer for English, and some other languages.

OPTIONS

       -h, --help
              Show summary of options.

       --version
              Prints the espeak library version and the location of the espeak voice data.

       -f <text file>
              Text file to speak.

       --stdin
              Read text input from stdin till to the end of a stream at once.

       If neither -f nor --stdin are provided, then <words> from parameter are spoken, or text is
       spoken from stdin, read separately one line by line at a time.

       -d <device>
              Use the specified device to speak the audio on. If not specified, the default audio
              device is used.

       -q     Quiet, don't produce any speech (may be useful with -x).

       -a <integer>
              Amplitude, 0 to 200, default is 100.

       -g <integer>
              Word gap. Pause between words, units of 10ms at the default speed.

       -k <integer>
              Indicate  capital  letters  with: 1=sound, 2=the word "capitals", higher values = a
              pitch increase (try -k20).

       -l <integer>
              Line length. If not zero (which is the default),  consider  lines  less  than  this
              length as end-of-clause.

       -p <integer>
              Pitch adjustment, 0 to 99, default is 50.

       -s <integer>
              Speed in words per minute, default is 175.

       -v <voice name>
              Use  voice file of this name from espeak-ng-data/voices. A variant can be specified
              using voice+variant, such as af+m3.

       -w <wave file name>
              Write output to this WAV file, rather than speaking it directly.

       --split=<minutes>
              Used with -w to split the audio output into <minutes> recorded chunks.

       -b     Input text encoding, 1=UTF8, 2=8 bit, 4=16 bit.

       -m     Indicates that the text contains SSML (Speech Synthesis Markup  Language)  tags  or
              other  XML  tags.  Those SSML tags which are supported are interpreted. Other tags,
              including HTML, are ignored, except that some HTML tags such as

       -x     Write phoneme mnemonics to stdout.

       -X     Write phonemes mnemonics and translation trace to stdout. If rules files have  been
              built with --compile=debug, line numbers will also be displayed.

       -z     No final sentence pause at the end of the text.

       --stdout
              Write speech output to stdout.

       --compile=voicename
              Compile   the   pronunciation  rules  and  dictionary  in  the  current  directory.
              =<voicename< is optional and specifies which language is compiled.

       --compile-debug=voicename
              Compile the pronunciation rules and dictionary in the current directory  as  above,
              but include line numbers, that get shown when -X is used.

       --ipa  Write  phonemes  to stdout using International Phonetic Alphabet. --ipa=1 Use ties,
              --ipa=2 Use ZWJ, --ipa=3 Separate with _.

       --tie=<character>
              The character to use to join multi-letter phonemes in -x and --ipa output.

       --path=<path>
              Specifies the directory containing the espeak-ng-data directory.

       --pho  Write mbrola phoneme data (.pho) to stdout or to the file in --phonout.

       --phonout=<filename>
              Write output from -x -X commands and mbrola phoneme data to this file.

       --punct="<characters>"
              Speak the names of punctuation characters  during  speaking.  If  =<characters>  is
              omitted, all punctuation is spoken.

       --sep=<character>
              The character to separate phonemes from the -x and --ipa output.

       --voices[=<language code>]
              Lists  the  available voices. If =<language code> is present then only those voices
              which are suitable for that language are listed. If xx-yy language code is  passed,
              then  voices  with  yy  of xx language variants are shown with higher priority than
              just xx. If variant is passed, then all voice variants are shown. If mb  or  mbrola
              is  passed, then all voices using the MBROLA voice synthesizer are shown. If all is
              passed, then all eSpeak NG voices, voice variants and MBROLA voices are shown.

       --voices=<directory>
              Lists the voices in the specified subdirectory.

EXAMPLES

       espeak-ng "This is a test"
              Speak the sentence "This is a test" using the default English voice.

       espeak-ng -f hello.txt
              Speak the contents of hello.txt using the default English voice.

       cat hello.txt | espeak-ng
              Speak the contents of hello.txt using the default English voice.

       espeak-ng -x hello
              Speak the word "hello" using the default English voice, and print the phonemes that
              were spoken.

       espeak-ng -ven-us "[[h@'loU]]"
              Speak the phonemes "h@'loU" using the American English voice.

       espeak-ng --voices
              List all voices supported by eSpeak.

       espeak-ng --voices=en
              List all voices that speak English (en).

       espeak-ng --voices=mb
              List all voices using the MBROLA voice synthesizer.

AUTHOR

       eSpeak  NG  is  maintained  by  Reece  H. Dunn msclrhd@gmail.com. It is based on eSpeak by
       Jonathan Duddington jonsd@jsd.clara.co.uk.

       This manual page is based on the eSpeak page written by Luke  Yelavich  themuso@ubuntu.com
       for the Ubuntu project.

                                            April 2024                               ESPEAK-NG(1)