CSS speak

The CSS speak property is used to determine whether or not to render text aurally.

The speak property can be used with speech media to specify whether or not an element should be read out, regardless of its display settings. For example, you could have some text that's read out on screen readers, even though it doesn't render on visual media (e.g. browsers) due to having display: none.

Syntax

Possible Values

auto

Resolves to a computed value of none when display is none, otherwise resolves to a computed value of auto which yields a used value of normal.

none

Suppresses aural rendering so that the element requires no time to render.

This can be applied against elements you don't want to be spoken. This element will be skipped and there will be no gap (of silence) where it would normally be. If you want a gap of silence, use the voice-volume property.

Note, however, that descendants may override this value and will be spoken.

normal

The element is rendered aurally (regardless of its display value, and the display and speak values of its ancestors). In other words, you can have the text rendered on speech media, even if it isn't displayed on visual media.

In addition, all CSS properties also accept the following CSS-wide keyword values as the sole component of their property value:

initial

Represents the value specified as the property's initial value.

inherit

Represents the computed value of the property on the element's parent.

unset

This value acts as either inherit or initial, depending on whether the property is inherited or not. In other words, it sets all properties to their parent value if they are inheritable or to their initial value if not inheritable.

General Information

Example Code

Official Specifications

• CSS Speech Module (W3C Candidate Recommendation 20 March 2012)
• CSS2.1 (W3C Recommendation 07 June 2011)