A simpler Speechify alternative for reading articles, PDFs, and EPUBs
Press play on the page you are already reading. Lullula reads it aloud in a natural voice, highlights each sentence and, once you sign in, keeps your place. Free to install, no account required to start, at a fraction of the price.
Free · No account needed · Installs in seconds
Most read-aloud tools just start talking. The good ones understand what they’re reading: where a sentence ends, when to pause, and which word carries the weight. That’s the difference between hearing an article and actually following one.
Same words, same speed. The browser sample is your own system voice, so this is exactly the difference on your machine.
Finding the article is the easy part
Firefox Reader View, Chrome’s reader and the tools built on them all find the article. So does Lullula. The difference starts after that. Your eyes do work a voice can’t: they skip a line that isn’t for you, back up half a paragraph, hold your place while you answer a message. On screen a line you don’t need costs you a glance; in your ear it costs you a sentence. Here is what Lullula puts around the voice.
It starts at the first sentence
Not at the top of the page. Reader views do this too — it’s table stakes, not our idea. We just don’t undo it the moment the voice starts.
The highlight follows the voice
Each sentence lights up as it’s spoken and the page scrolls to keep it in view. Glance back after doing something else and you’re on the right line instead of hunting for it.
Speed, and a step back by sentence
0.5× to 2×, in seven steps. Back and forward move one whole sentence rather than a fixed number of seconds, so hearing something again starts where the thought starts.
It remembers the sentence
With a free account, Lullula picks up on the sentence you stopped on: close the tab, come back tomorrow, press play. It keeps a place per page rather than one bookmark for the whole browser.
Google Docs, PDFs and EPUBs work the same way
Same player and, once you sign in, the same saved place, on a doc, a paper or a book. PDFs and EPUBs highlight the sentence in place; in Google Docs it appears in a caption bar along the bottom of the window instead. Text-based and scanned PDFs, and DRM-free EPUBs.
Three things worth saying plainly
- We haven’t measured Speechify’s extraction. So nothing on this page claims anything about which lines Speechify reads or skips. Where we compare below, it’s on things you can check yourself: price, platforms, formats, voices.
- This page used to say something false. An earlier version implied that other read-aloud tools read your menus, your cookie banner and your ads. They don’t. Firefox Reader View, Chrome’s reader and the tools built on them find the article, the same as we do. We’ve taken the claim down, and we’re not replacing it with a different claim about who extracts better.
- Where a voice and an eye part ways. On one YouTube page in our test set, Firefox’s Readability handed the reader
19MLikes1,813,587,300Viewsand 48 more lines like it. Read out loud, that one line is “one billion, eight hundred thirteen million, five hundred eighty-seven thousand, three hundred.” Lines like that are what we tune for, and we score ourselves against Mozilla Readability — the extraction library behind Firefox Reader View — on the same pages, and keep the losses in. One caveat matters more than the result: we ran that benchmark ourselves. The rules behind it shipped in v1.6.0 on 13 September 2026. We last re-ran the benchmark on 23 September 2026, on the v1.7.1 code, and every figure was unchanged. Everything in the five rows above is in every store version today.
Why readers pick Lullula
A fraction of the price
Premium voices and generous everyday listening from $5/mo billed annually — premium plans on the big-name readers cost several times more.
Free, no account
Install from the Chrome Web Store, Edge Add-ons or Firefox Add-ons and press play — no sign-up wall before you can hear a single word.
Web, PDF & EPUB
One extension for articles, research papers, and e-books — with live sentence highlighting on all of them.
An honest head-to-head
Where Lullula wins, and where Speechify's bigger ecosystem still leads. No fabricated numbers — just the differences that matter day to day.
Compared on what matters for reading articles on the web · Last updated June 2026 · Speechify's plans change — check their site for current details.
When is Speechify the better pick? It is the more mature product on mobile, with native iOS and Android apps, a larger catalog of premium and celebrity voices, plus OCR/photo scanning and dictation. If you mostly listen on a phone, need to scan printed pages or photos, or want those specific voices, it may suit you better. Lullula is the better fit for desktop reading — articles, Google Docs, PDFs, and EPUBs — where it highlights each sentence as it reads, keeps your place on every page once you sign in, starts free with no account, and costs a fraction of the price.
Switch in 30 seconds
No export, no import, no account — just install and press play.
Add the extension
Install Lullula free from the Chrome Web Store, Edge Add-ons or Firefox Add-ons.
Open any page or PDF
Go to the article, PDF, or EPUB you want to hear.
Press play
Lullula starts at the first sentence and highlights each one as it reads.
Start free, upgrade for a few dollars a month
Install and listen for free — no account or card needed.
Listen to any page with your browser's built-in voices — no account needed.
- Read web pages, PDFs & EPUBs
- Unlimited listening in built-in browser voices
- 2,000 words of premium AI voice every month, once you sign in
- AI summaries, from that same allowance
- Starts at the article, not the top of the page
- Reading history, synced across devices once you sign in
Every premium neural voice, and enough listening to get through your week.
- 600+ premium neural voices, 80+ languages
- 200,000 words a month in premium voices
- About 22 hours of listening every month
- AI summaries, from that same allowance
- Reading history, synced across devices
Questions, answered
Is Lullula really free?
Yes. Lullula is free to install with no account, and listening in your browser's built-in voices is unlimited. You also get a one-time premium-voice trial of 2,500 characters (about 500 words) without an account, plus 10 AI summaries from a separate allowance. A free account adds about 2,000 premium words each month, shared with AI summaries; Pro adds a monthly allowance of premium listening from $5/mo billed annually.
Is there a free alternative to Speechify?
Yes — Lullula is a free Speechify alternative. Install it and read any web page, PDF or EPUB aloud at no cost and without an account; a free account adds 2,000 words a month of the premium neural voices, and paid plans raise that allowance.
How is Lullula different from Speechify?
Lullula reads the page you are already on: it starts at the first sentence of the article, highlights each sentence as it speaks, and, once you sign in, picks up where you stopped — on web pages, Google Docs, PDFs and EPUBs. It also adds an instant AI summary. It is free to install with no account, and premium plans cost a fraction of typical text-to-speech subscriptions.
Is Lullula cheaper than Speechify?
Lullula's premium plan starts at $5/mo billed annually, and there is a free tier that needs no account. Speechify's premium plans typically cost several times more — check Speechify's site for their current pricing.
Can I switch from Speechify easily?
Yes. Add Lullula from the Chrome Web Store, Edge Add-ons or Firefox Add-ons and open any page, PDF, or EPUB — there is no import step and no account needed to start listening.
Does Lullula read PDFs and EPUBs?
Yes — Lullula reads PDFs and EPUBs aloud with the same sentence highlighting. Learn more about reading PDFs aloud and reading EPUBs aloud.
Does Lullula work on mobile?
Lullula is a browser extension for desktop browsers today; mobile apps are coming soon. If you mainly listen on iOS or Android, a native app like Speechify may fit better. On the desktop web, Lullula reads articles, PDFs, and EPUBs aloud.
Do I need an account to start?
No. Lullula installs from the Chrome Web Store, Edge Add-ons or Firefox Add-ons and starts reading without an account. You need one (it's free) for Lullula to keep your place on each page and carry your voice picks to another computer, to get 2,000 premium-voice words every month, or to upgrade to a paid plan.
Hear it instead of reading it
A free Speechify alternative for the reading you already have open. Explore what else Lullula reads aloud: web pages, PDFs, and EPUBs.
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