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Add to SafariWhen comparing Voice Dream Reader vs Natural Reader, the Slant community recommends Voice Dream Reader for most people. In the question“What is the best text to speech software for Mac and iOS?” Voice Dream Reader is ranked 2nd while Natural Reader is ranked 5th. The most important reason people chose Voice Dream Reader is:
If you look at the screen while the app is reading, the text scrolls and emphasizes the sentence and the individual words as they are read, kinda like high quality karaoke lyrics.
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Easy to follow along with your eyes
If you look at the screen while the app is reading, the text scrolls and emphasizes the sentence and the individual words as they are read, kinda like high quality karaoke lyrics.
Pro Imported document (PDF, ePub, Doc, Mobi, TXT) is displayed in an easy to read, nicely arranged format.
VDR arranges most documents you import into a clean, easy to read format that is customizable. Can control the size of margins, select from several fonts & adjust the size, change text, background & highlight colours. Can swipe and view text in original layout/format or view as plain text and lose all the formatting for a simpler view of material.
Pro Dropbox source
By being able to connect to Dropbox in the Voice Dream Reader app, you can open and read books that are stored in your Dropbox account.
Pro Highlighting text
Allows highlighting text on the fly.
Pro Inexpensive
Compared to the alternatives, this is a cheap solution.
Pro Very efficient voices
Pro Has the best share implementation I've seen on iOS
Voice Dream Reader has a share sheet extension for iOS. When you use it, there are three options, you can save in Aritcle format (text and images), PDF format, and Full Text format. and it will show you a preview of what it will look like so you know what to expect.
Pro Has OCR companion app
Here.
Pro Instant pickup
Just click on a new page or new paragraph to skip boring sections. Also, allows speed increments changes to a very small accurate degree - i.e. to read at the right speed.
Pro Reflows PDF text content as plain text
This feature lets you read along beautifully and in the focused and pac man modes. Great for studying purposes.
Pro Reads many formats
Formats include: Microsoft Word, PDF, eBook (ePUb), text, and RTF files, webpages.
Pro Prices reflect arrogance
It could be a perfect suite of voices if macOS could in extension include them when working on alternative apps or browsing, etc. You could if you preferred go along for the Standard Offering but as set forth before, Natural Reader ought to include macOS users and with recognition other than imposing Google Chrome as the default.
Pro Simple but effective playback controls
You can click on a any sentence and the voice will jump to wherever that sentence is and continue on from there. Forward and back button is for one sentence. Shortcuts are available as well for pause/read, forward/back by one sentence.
Cons
Con Ugly interface
The interface is ugly and not well thought out. For instance, putting items in folders removes the details from the list and replaces it with the name of the folder. Also, adding folder names has an ugly double popup.
Con Cannot read via OCR
If you have image based PDFs for example, this won't be able to read it, at least not without pre processing with other OCR software before exporting/uploading to Dream Reader. That being said, VoiceDream Reader now has a companion app to make OCR > Voice Dream Reader very simple and easy. Visit this link.
Con Can't play DRM protected content
Con Few voices
When bought, a voice package from the iOS App Store, as part of a package with voice writer & voice dream, had over 20 voices/accents, now there are only 2 voices.
Con No Safari Support
Great options although it could be more affordable. It is not as if most average consumer is financially strong enough to afford all? If prices were lower, their premium offers could sell like other very successful great ideas.
Con Free version available, but upgrades are costly
$69.50, $129.50, or $199.50, does not appear to be a lifetime purchase, there seems to be a limit on how many images that can be used with the OCR function within the different tiers.
Con Few hotkeys, not user configurable
The shortcuts/hotkeys that exist are simple and work well, but they are not user configurable which might be a problem for some. The app is more GUI driven, a travesty since accessibility is a big attraction for people seeking software like this.
Con Unstable on MacOS High Sierra
Encountered stability issues on MacOS High Sierra. Changing voices or opening a .docx Word document can cause crashes.
