01In plain English
Text-to-speech turns written words into spoken audio. Modern AI voices can sound close to a real person, with control over accent, pace and emotion, and some can copy a specific voice from a sample.
02Why it matters when you are choosing
It is used for voiceovers, audiobooks, support phone lines and making content accessible. Quality, the number of languages and the rights to use the audio vary a lot between tools.
03What to check
Ask the vendor
Listen to samples in your language, check the commercial use rights for the audio, and check the rules on cloning voices.