Text-to-Speech for Better Focus: Tools That Actually Work with Academic PDFs

[novamuller]

Hey everyone,

Lately, I’ve been exploring text-to-speech (TTS) tools to help me focus better while studying. Listening to research papers instead of reading them helps me stay engaged and manage long study sessions more effectively. The issue is, many of the Chrome-based TTS extensions don’t work smoothly with the academic PDFs I store in Paperpile.

I’m hoping to find a tool that can handle complex formatting and works directly in the browser. Has anyone here found a solid, accessible TTS tool that reads academic PDFs clearly and easily?

Would love to hear what’s worked for you!

[sandragahan]

Totally get where you're coming from. I also retain information better through listening, and many standard TTS tools just don’t cut it with research articles.

One tool I’d recommend using is AudioModify. It’s a browser-based text-to-speech solution that works really well with academic PDFs—even when the formatting gets tricky. I just open the file in a new tab and let it do its thing. Super clean interface and great voice clarity.