Extensions / Read Text Aloud

Read Text Aloud privacy policy

Last updated: October 19, 2026

Read Text Aloud is a browser extension that reads web pages, selected text or text you paste aloud with the speech engine built into Chrome, and highlights the sentence being read. This policy describes exactly what it does with your data.

The short version

• The extension collects nothing. There is no account, and there are no analytics or trackers inside the extension.
• The extension makes no network requests of its own.
• By default, a voice on your computer reads, and your text stays on this computer.
• If you choose one of Google's online voices, Chrome sends the text being read to Google to make the sound.

How it works

The extension works only on the tab where you click its icon, press its keyboard shortcut or choose one of its items in the right-click menu. On that tab it finds the main text of the page, or takes the text you selected, splits it into sentences and passes them one at a time to Chrome's text-to-speech engine. The highlight and the small player are drawn on top of the page; the text of the website is not changed.

The Paste text page is part of the extension: text you paste there is read the same way.

Voices

• Voices marked On device come with your operating system. They work offline, and the text stays on this computer. One of them is used by default.
• Voices marked Online are Google's voices built into Chrome. They need the internet: to speak with them, Chrome itself, not the extension's code, sends the text being read to Google. They are used only if you choose one yourself. Google handles this text under the Google Privacy Policy. If an online voice cannot start because you are offline, reading continues with a voice on your computer.

What stays in your browser

• In the extension's storage on this computer (chrome.storage.local): your reading speed, the voice you chose for each language, whether highlighting is on, whether you have seen the first-run tip, and the last text you pasted on the Paste text page with the time it was saved, until you click Clear.
• Also in chrome.storage.local, for the rating request: the dates of up to five days on which you used the extension, how many times you clicked Not now, the date until which the request stays hidden, and whether you have clicked a star. Which star you clicked is not stored.
• In session memory (chrome.storage.session), cleared when you close Chrome: the text you are listening to, the address and title of its page and your place in it; for up to 10 tabs where you stopped reading, the page address and title, its text and the place you stopped; and technical details of the last failed start, if there was one.

None of this is synced to your other devices or sent to the developer, and all of it is deleted when you remove the extension.

Permissions, explained

• activeTab — to read the text of the tab where you clicked the icon, pressed the shortcut or chose a menu item. It gives no access to your other tabs.
• scripting — to add to that tab the script that finds the text, highlights the sentence being read and shows the player.
• contextMenus — to add Read selection aloud and Read from here to the right-click menu.
• tts — to speak the text with the text-to-speech voices available in Chrome.
• storage — to keep the settings, the pasted text and the rating-request record listed above on this computer, and your place in a reading until Chrome closes.

The extension does not ask for access to all websites: it can read a tab only after you use it there.

Pages the extension opens

• After installation it opens a one-time welcome page, and after removal your browser opens a page that asks why you removed it.
• After you have used the extension on five different days (a day counts when a reading finishes or plays for at least two minutes), its popup asks Is Read Text Aloud useful? and shows five stars. Clicking 4 or 5 stars opens the extension's reviews page in the Chrome Web Store; clicking 1 to 3 stars opens a short feedback page. Not now hides the question for 30 days, and a second click hides it for good. The extension itself sends nothing when you click a star, and the address it opens contains no information about you.
• The welcome, removal and feedback pages are ordinary web pages hosted on GitHub Pages. They may use standard, anonymous web analytics. Like other websites, these pages and this policy are served by third parties: GitHub Pages hosts them and Google Fonts provides the typeface. Both receive your IP address and basic browser details when a page loads.
• Feedback you choose to send on the removal page or the feedback page goes to the developer through Google Forms, and only when you press Send feedback. It contains only what you pick and type; the pages add no identifiers.
• The Change link in the extension's settings opens Chrome's own keyboard shortcuts page.

Changes

If this policy changes, the updated version will be published at this address with a new date above.

Contact

Questions? Open an issue on GitHub. Issues are public, so do not include anything you want to keep private.

Google and Chrome are trademarks of Google LLC. Read Text Aloud is an independent project and is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Google LLC.