1ESPEAK-NG(1) General Commands Manual ESPEAK-NG(1)
2
6 espeak-ng - A multi-lingual software speech synthesizer.
7
9 espeak-ng [options] [words]
10
12 espeak-ng is a software speech synthesizer for English, and some other
13 languages.
14
16 -h, --help
17 Show summary of options.
18 --version
20 Prints the espeak library version and the location of the espeak
21 voice data.
22 -f <text file>
24 Text file to speak.
25 --stdin
27 Read text input from stdin instead of a file.
28 If neither -f nor --stdin are provided, <words> are spoken, or if no
30 words are provided then text is spoken from stdin a line at a time.
31 -d <device>
33 Use the specified device to speak the audio on. If not speci‐
34 fied, the default audio device is used.
35 -q Quiet, don´t produce any speech (may be useful with -x).
37 -a <integer>
39 Amplitude, 0 to 200, default is 100.
40 -g <integer>
42 Word gap. Pause between words, units of 10ms at the default
43 speed.
44 -k <integer>
46 Indicate capital letters with: 1=sound, 2=the word "capitals",
47 higher values = a pitch increase (try -k20).
48 -l <integer>
50 Line length. If not zero (which is the default), consider lines
51 less than this length as end-of-clause.
52 -p <integer>
54 Pitch adjustment, 0 to 99, default is 50.
55 -s <integer>
57 Speed in words per minute, default is 175.
58 -v <voice name>
60 Use voice file of this name from espeak-ng-data/voices. A vari‐
61 ant can be specified using voice+variant, such as af+m3.
62 -w <wave file name>
64 Write output to this WAV file, rather than speaking it directly.
65 --split=<minutes>
67 Used with -w to split the audio output into <minutes> recorded
68 chunks.
69 -b Input text encoding, 1=UTF8, 2=8 bit, 4=16 bit.
71 -m Indicates that the text contains SSML (Speech Synthesis Markup
73 Language) tags or other XML tags. Those SSML tags which are sup‐
74 ported are interpreted. Other tags, including HTML, are ignored,
75 except that some HTML tags such as
76 -x Write phoneme mnemonics to stdout.
78 -X Write phonemes mnemonics and translation trace to stdout. If
80 rules files have been built with --compile=debug, line numbers
81 will also be displayed.
82 -z No final sentence pause at the end of the text.
84 --stdout
86 Write speech output to stdout.
87 --compile=voicename
89 Compile the pronunciation rules and dictionary in the current
90 directory. =<voicename< is optional and specifies which language
91 is compiled.
92 --compile-debug=voicename
94 Compile the pronunciation rules and dictionary in the current
95 directory as above, but include line numbers, that get shown
96 when -X is used.
97 --ipa Write phonemes to stdout using International Phonetic Alphabet.
99 --ipa=1 Use ties, --ipa=2 Use ZWJ, --ipa=3 Separate with _.
100 --tie=<character>
102 The character to use to join multi-letter phonemes in -x and
103 --ipa output.
104 --path=<path>
106 Specifies the directory containing the espeak-ng-data directory.
107 --pho Write mbrola phoneme data (.pho) to stdout or to the file in
109 --phonout.
110 --phonout=<filename>
112 Write output from -x -X commands and mbrola phoneme data to this
113 file.
114 --punct="<characters>"
116 Speak the names of punctuation characters during speaking. If
117 =<characters> is omitted, all punctuation is spoken.
118 --sep=<character>
120 The character to separate phonemes from the -x and --ipa output.
121 --voices[=<language code>]
123 Lists the available voices. If =<language code> is present then
124 only those voices which are suitable for that language are
125 listed.
126 --voices=<directory>
128 Lists the voices in the specified subdirectory.
129
131 espeak-ng "This is a test"
132 Speak the sentence "This is a test" using the default English
133 voice.
134 espeak-ng -f hello.txt
136 Speak the contents of hello.txt using the default English voice.
137 cat hello.txt | espeak-ng
139 Speak the contents of hello.txt using the default English voice.
140 espeak-ng -x hello
142 Speak the word "hello" using the default English voice, and
143 print the phonemes that were spoken.
144 espeak-ng -ven-us "[[h@´loU]]"
146 Speak the phonemes "h@´loU" using the American English voice.
147 espeak-ng --voices
149 List all voices supported by eSpeak.
150 espeak-ng --voices=en
152 List all voices that speak English (en).
153 espeak-ng --voices=mb
155 List all voices using the MBROLA voice synthesizer.
156
158 eSpeak NG is maintained by Reece H. Dunn msclrhd@gmail.com. It is based
159 on eSpeak by Jonathan Duddington jonsd@jsd.clara.co.uk.
160 This manual page is based on the eSpeak page written by Luke Yelavich
162 themuso@ubuntu.com for the Ubuntu project.
163 November 2019 ESPEAK-NG(1)