What's the best tool for listening to articles?

Question

Medium just launched audio stories, which seems like a cool feature! But it's a members-only feature. There are alternatives out there... what's your favorite?

Maria Nicolae · Accepted Answer

Listle is an app that allows people to listen to an increasing library of interesting audio articles - read by people. 15 new audio articles are added every day. You can find articles on current events, top HN stories or your favourite PG essays, in audio.

Link to mobile app: https://listle.app.link/m2DbuzvEDZ

Niv Dror · Answer

This seems like a very popular Chrome extension for listening to articles. Did well in the Product Hunt launch 😊

Niv Dror · Answer

The product looks super well done, and seems like the first real value feature in the Medium Members upgrade. Wondering what @rrhoover things as he is a member :-)

Kunal Bhatia · Answer

I use Play.ht for providing audio for my Medium readers. They are robotic voices, but it gets the job done and it's very easy to get started. You can even embed the player inside your own articles.

Kate · Answer

Instead of reading the news, enjoy it being read to you! Plus, it's read to you in a friendly human voice (instead of a robot voice, because as much as I like Alexa and Siri, they don't have the same finesse).

Keyul · Answer

I was going to recommend this when I saw the question. But you already did. This is definitely the best extension to listen to Medium articles.

Answer

I use Pocket A LOT so I tend to get a lot of backed up content to get through. Sometimes its easier to use Pocket listen. Although the voice is fairly robot-y

Josh · Answer

Narro has been doing this longer than the others and is continuing to release new features and voices!

ryan · Answer

Audm is an iOS app that lets you listen to audio versions of longform feature articles from publishers like The Atlantic, The New York Review of Books, ProPublica, Outside Magazine, Foreign Policy, and London Review of Books. The stories are read by audiobook narrators.

Raman Ksaitor · Answer

Real people narrate your content. REAL. PEOPLE.
Synthesized voice is nowhere near. We are starting out with top HN articles and cryptocurrency whitepapers, but will soon start narrating any article or document on demand.
Subscribe to keep tabs on our progress!

LekanB · Answer

I use this everyday. Look past the old school design, this is the BEST TTS app. Integrates with Pocket, Google Drive and reads PDF's too.

Nick Abouzeid · Answer

These are just tech articles sourced from Medium and run through IBM's Watson text to speech generator. Not as natural as a normal audiobook/podcast, but they do the trick.

Nathan Baschez · Answer

I love Audm! It's the only way I can get through long David Frum pieces in The Atlantic :)

Robert Sampson · Answer

Articles read professionally by flesh and blood humans from publications like the Guardian, AEON, Idler, Nautilus, etc...

Howard Huang · Answer

This is what I gravitate towards. Just save an article, click the share button --> speak and it reads the article to you.

Sabina Horga · Answer

The best there is! Super interesting and eclectic listens!

Answer

Realiti News is a newer simple and beautiful audio news app that lets you listen to Wired, Time, Huffington Post, Mashable, TechCrunch, Reuters, Slate, and Gizmodo read to you by professional human narrators, each morning, when the daily feed is refreshed with the latest articles. :)

Nick Abouzeid · Answer

DuoBook works wonderfully - you can switch back and forth between reading & listening, which makes it perfect for someone who has a hard time dedicating time to just listening to a book 😅

Jake Crump · Answer

This is super helpful for anyone who doesn't have a ton of time, but still wants to enjoy audiobooks.

Ayush Mittal · Answer

Been using Play for Medium and sometimes Audiofy while driving. Ability to connect with Pocket/Instapaper, save from Safari/Chrome or Discover the latest feed. Voice is not as great as Play.

Heinrich Tessendorf · Answer

Voice Aloud Reader is still the only app I've ever paid for, just because I received so much value from the free, ad supported version. It plays almost any file type, syncs with Pocket, Dropbox, Google Drive and it's really easy to skip or go back a sentence or paragraph.

Nino · Answer

It uses latest-gen text-to-speech voices and curates a list of trending articles for you, so you don't have to worry about what do you want to listen to.

Costinel Pleseanu · Answer

Great app

Ambrose Leung · Answer

My service works on all platforms - you just email the article URL to an email address (or use the Chrome Extension) and it will be added to your list your personal podcast feed is automatically updated as well.

the unique feature that my service has is that you can tag articles and have them played by tag on the Amazon Echo.

Obviously the parser may not work on all websites, so if it is doing TTS on text that is not relevant, just email me and I'll get that fixed.

Duncan McClean · Answer

It's great for listening to articles and turning them into a private podcast.

Nikos Melachrinos · Answer

Great text to speech app. Has brilliant keyboard shortcuts :)