{"id":147195,"date":"2019-08-20T16:49:24","date_gmt":"2019-08-20T16:49:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sftarticles.wpenginepowered.com\/en\/?p=147195"},"modified":"2025-07-01T21:33:39","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T04:33:39","slug":"microsoft-edge-update-will-make-it-perfect-for-bedtime-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/microsoft-edge-update-will-make-it-perfect-for-bedtime-stories\/","title":{"rendered":"Microsoft Edge update will make it perfect for bedtime stories"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-147212\" src=\"https:\/\/articles-img.sftcdn.net\/sft\/articles\/auto-mapping-folder\/sites\/3\/2020\/12\/Microsofot_Edge_Read_Aloud_header_ok4wig.jpg\" width=\"700\" height=\"394\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Microsoft Edge has had a tumultuous existence since it first launched. It has rightly been <a href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/microsoft-edge-is-getting-a-brand-new-mobile-app-and-5-more-reasons-to-try-microsofts-new-web-browser\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">lauded by critics and supporters<\/a> but struggled to make a dent in <a href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/google-chrome-5-billion-downloads\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Chrome\u2019s dominance of the market<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/microsoft-edge-browser-on-windows-10\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Microsoft Edge has now migrated to the Chromium ecosphere<\/a>, which means some people claim it is no more than a different version of Google Chrome. The move has done Edge well though and moving closer to Chrome has actually given it the room it needed to gain traction for the key features that set it apart from the Google web browser offering.<\/p>\n<div class=\"sc-card-program\">\r\n  <div class=\"sc-card-program__body\">\r\n    <div class=\"sc-card-program__row clearfix\">\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-program__col-logo\">\r\n        <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sc-card-program__img\" alt=\"Microsoft Edge\" src=\"https:\/\/images.sftcdn.net\/images\/t_optimized,f_auto\/p\/449d6486-96d2-11e6-b4e2-00163ec9f5fa\/390199485\/microsoft-edge-logo.png\" width=\"100px\" height=\"100px\">\r\n      <\/div>\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-program__col-title\">\r\n        <span class=\"sc-card-program__title\">Microsoft Edge<\/span>\r\n        <a class=\"sc-card-program__button sc-card-program-internal\" href=\"https:\/\/microsoft-edge.en.softonic.com\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Download Microsoft Edge Now<\/a>\r\n      <\/div>\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-program__col-rating\">\r\n        <svg class=\"rating-score__content\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" version=\"1.1\" x=\"0\" y=\"0\" viewbox=\"0 0 50 50\" enable-background=\"new 0 0 50 50\" xml:space=\"preserve\"><path class=\"rating-score__background rating-score--good\" fill=\"none\" stroke-width=\"6\" stroke-miterlimit=\"10\" d=\"M40 40c8.3-8.3 8.3-21.7 0-30s-21.7-8.3-30 0 -8.3 21.7 0 30\"><\/path><path class=\"rating-score__value rating-score__value--60\" fill=\"none\" stroke-width=\"6\" stroke-dashoffset=\"60\" stroke-miterlimit=\"10\" d=\"M40 40c8.3-8.3 8.3-21.7 0-30s-21.7-8.3-30 0 -8.3 21.7 0 30\"><\/path><text class=\"rating-score__number\" content=\"6\" text-anchor=\"middle\" transform=\"matrix(1 0 0 1 25 31.0837)\" data-auto=\"app-user-score\">6<\/text><\/svg>\r\n      <\/div>\r\n    <\/div>\r\n    <div class=\"sc-card-program__row\">\r\n      <span class=\"sc-card-program__description\">The idea of Microsoft Edge is to be as fast, clean, and lightweight as possible to cope with the demands of different devices, whether it be a PC, tablet or phone.<\/span>\r\n    <\/div>\r\n    <div class=\"sc-card-program__row\">\r\n      <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sc-card-program__bigpic\" src=\"\" onerror=\"this.style.display='none'\">\r\n    <\/div>\r\n    <a class=\"sc-card-program__link track-link sc-card-program-internal\" href=\"https:\/\/microsoft-edge.en.softonic.com\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><\/a>\r\n  <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n<p>One of those key differentiating features has been the reading mode and the connected read aloud mode. <a href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/google-chrome-reader-mode\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Chrome has a rudimentary reading mode buried deep within its code<\/a>, but it is nowhere near as good as the reading mode on Edge, which can present crisp and clear text for any page of the internet. The Edge read aloud mode goes one further and actually reads out all the text, saving you the eye strain.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_147211\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-147211\" style=\"width: 700px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-147211\" src=\"https:\/\/articles-img.sftcdn.net\/sft\/articles\/auto-mapping-folder\/sites\/3\/2020\/12\/Microsoft_Edge_Reading_mode_ucblwc.jpg\" alt=\"Edge's clear reading mode\" width=\"700\" height=\"590\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-147211\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Edge&#8217;s Reading Mode is very clear and far superior to Google Chrome&#8217;s<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Read aloud has been far from a perfect feature though, and Microsoft has received a lot of feedback about how it could be improved. Feedback it is now clear that the software giant has been listening to.<\/p>\n<h2>Microsoft Edge\u2019s read aloud mode is getting much more natural sounding voices<\/h2>\n<p>The key feedback Microsoft has been receiving on the feature is that voices doing the reading sound unnatural and robotic. <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.windows.com\/msedgedev\/2019\/08\/14\/cloud-powered-voices-microsoft-edge-chromium\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Microsoft has released a blog post<\/a> outlining how it plans to use \u201ccloud powered voices\u201d to deal with these complaints, including two new styles of voice that will be available to Edge users; Neural voices and Standard 24kbps voices.<\/p>\n<div class=\"sc-card-starred-link\">\r\n  <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__body\">\r\n    <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__row clearfix\">\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__col-logo\">\r\n        <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sc-card-starred-link__img\" src=\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/TjDAOP-UcX_XOhZtHclsmdNcuIiCF4qKKk6xWss-OEkR56DjrhIfv6JPl0PDRmz83rA=w300\" width=\"100px\" height=\"100px\">\r\n      <\/div>\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__col-title\">\r\n        <p class=\"sc-card-starred-link__title\">Five reasons to try Microsoft Edge<\/p>\r\n        <a class=\"sc-card-starred-link__button\" href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/microsoft-edge-is-getting-a-brand-new-mobile-app-and-5-more-reasons-to-try-microsofts-new-web-browser\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer sponsored\">Read now<\/a>\r\n      <\/div>\r\n    <\/div>\r\n    <a class=\"sc-card-starred-link__link\" href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/microsoft-edge-is-getting-a-brand-new-mobile-app-and-5-more-reasons-to-try-microsofts-new-web-browser\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer sponsored\"><\/a>\r\n  <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n<p>The post describes Neural voices as, \u201cPowered by deep neural networks\u2026\u201d and claims that, \u201cthese voices are the most natural sounding voices available today.\u201d The Standard voices are described as being similar to the voices that are available already, but they\u2019ll sound clearer due to an increased bitrate of 24kbps.<\/p>\n<h2>How to use the Microsoft Edge Read Aloud features<\/h2>\n<figure id=\"attachment_147210\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-147210\" style=\"width: 700px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-147210\" src=\"https:\/\/articles-img.sftcdn.net\/sft\/articles\/auto-mapping-folder\/sites\/3\/2020\/12\/Microsofot_Edge_Read_Aloud_ev3d5t.jpg\" alt=\"Microsoft Edge Nureal voice read aloud\" width=\"700\" height=\"575\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-147210\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Image via: Microsoft blog<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Microsoft has also endeavored to make these new read aloud voices as accessible as possible. If you\u2019re a Microsoft Edge user and you\u2019d like to try out the new features, it couldn\u2019t be simpler. All you have to do is open Microsoft Edge and navigate to the page you want Edge to read. Then, you simply highlight the text you want reading aloud, right-click, and then select <strong>Read aloud section<\/strong>. This will start the Read Aloud feature and will also open the Read Aloud menu, which will give you the option of selecting the type of voice you want to hear.<\/p>\n<p>So, with new neural voices sounding more natural than ever, would you consider letting the Microsoft Edge browser read you a bedtime story to help you get to sleep at night?<\/p>\n<div class=\"sc-card-starred-link\">\r\n  <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__body\">\r\n    <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__row clearfix\">\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__col-logo\">\r\n        <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"sc-card-starred-link__img\" src=\"https:\/\/articles-img.sftcdn.net\/sft\/articles\/auto-mapping-folder\/sites\/3\/2017\/10\/Edge-Chrome.jpg\" width=\"100px\" height=\"100px\">\r\n      <\/div>\r\n      <div class=\"sc-card-starred-link__col-title\">\r\n        <p class=\"sc-card-starred-link__title\">Sometimes even Microsoft needs to use Google Chrome<\/p>\r\n        <a class=\"sc-card-starred-link__button\" href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/sometimes-even-microsoft-needs-to-use-google-chrome\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer sponsored\">Read now<\/a>\r\n      <\/div>\r\n    <\/div>\r\n    <a class=\"sc-card-starred-link__link\" href=\"https:\/\/en.softonic.com\/articles\/sometimes-even-microsoft-needs-to-use-google-chrome\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer sponsored\"><\/a>\r\n  <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Microsoft Edge\u2019s read aloud mode is getting much more natural sounding voices<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9073,"featured_media":147213,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wpcf-pageviews":0},"categories":[1015],"tags":[2379,1031,1072,1126],"usertag":[],"vertical":[],"content-category":[],"class_list":["post-147195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-app-subdomain-redirectionmicrosoft-edge","tag-browsers","tag-microsoft","tag-online"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9073"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147195"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":325555,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147195\/revisions\/325555"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147195"},{"taxonomy":"usertag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/usertag?post=147195"},{"taxonomy":"vertical","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vertical?post=147195"},{"taxonomy":"content-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/content-category?post=147195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}