Everyone knows FL Studio as a music production software, but did you know it can also convert text to speech?
Yep, it’s true!
Like those popular synthesis platforms, FL Studio has a built-in Text-to-Speech (TTS) technology that reads aloud text input.
In this article, I’ll show you how to convert text to speech on FL Studio using the stock speech synthesizer and other compatible third-party plugins.
Using Speech Synthesizer (Stock Plugin)
Speech Synthesizer is a built-in synthesizer on FL Studio. It’s only available for the Windows versions of FL Studio.
If you are using MacOS, check out third-party Text-to-Speech plugins.
Note that you can’t find the built-in Speech Synthesizer plugin in FL’s plugin database, but you can access it by following these steps:
Open the Browser window and scroll down to the “Speech” folder.
If you can’t find the browser window, click the “View” button on the menu panel. This will open up a drop-down menu. (see the image below for reference)
From this menu, click and activate “Browser” under the windows section. Once you activate, there will be a tick mark near this option.
Once you see the browser window and open the “Speech” folder. Now you’ll see a similar window (as the image below).
Now drag and drop (import) any speech files from the list to FL’s Channel rack.
Once you do this, it’ll open up the Speech properties interface of Speech Synthesizer.
In this window, on the text box, you can type in or paste the text for which you want to generate speech.
After you type in the text, you can use the preview button next to it to playback the reference voice.
If unsatisfied with the output, you can tweak some settings under the Voice character window.
The personality setting gives you a series of vocal textures like male, female, robotic, martian, child, old woman, troll, nerd, choirboy, etc.
You can use it to instantly change the tonality of the generated voice.
Under the style settings, you have four options: natural, monotone, sing, and random.
Each of these options plays around with the pitch of the voice. In my testing, I found “natural” to be more realistic.
The mode settings have three options, normal, breathy, and whispered. It adds some noise to the voice, making it sound “airy” as you go up the settings.
Word rate/Word Per Minute (WPM) setting defines how fast the words are spoken. Here, you have to set the value in numerals.
For example, if you set it to 20, the synthesizer will play 20 words per minute.
The next control you have over the voice is the pitch keyboard. Here you can set the pitch of voice using a virtual keyboard interface.
I got a good speech output in my testing using the following settings:
| Settings | Value |
|---|---|
| Personality | Crisp male |
| Style | Natural |
| Mode | Normal |
| Word rate (WPM) | 195 |
| Key | B |
Once you are happy with the output, press the Accept button in the Speech properties interface.
It’ll process the text and open up a file explorer window asking you to name and save the speech file (shown in the image below). Click Save to store the file on your computer.
With the speech file, a WAV file will also be saved. It’ll then automatically load up this WAV file on a sampler in the channel rack of FL Studio (as shown below).
You can now easily link the generated speech sample to a mixer track to further add other effects like auto-tune, reverb, etc.
Convert Text to Speech on FL Studio Using Third-Party Plugins
Since the stock Speech Synthesizer on FL Studio is not as flexible as regular text-to-speech generators, you can also consider using third-party plugins to get more control over the voice output.
Following are some of the best compatible plugins that can convert text to speech on FL Studio. They will also work on other DAWs.
| Plugin | Type | Compatibility | Paid/Free |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vocaloid | VST, Standalone | Windows, Mac | Paid |
| Chipspeech | VST, VST3, AU (Mac only), AAX, Standalone | Windows, Mac | Paid |
| VST Speek or AU Speek | VST, AU (Mac only) | Windows, Mac | Free |
| Alter/Ego | VST, VST3, AU (Mac only), AAX, Standalone | Windows, Mac | Free |
Among the paid Vocaloid and Chipspeech plugins, Chipspeech is less memory intensive and can run on PCs with minimal features.
They both can cost anywhere between $100 – $150. You can try their demo/trial versions to make a better decision.
Among the free-to-use plugins, Alter/Ego is memory intensive but has a larger sound bank.
VST Speek, on the other hand, is relatively light as it only has a single robotic sound and lets you adjust basic parameters like pitch, speed, mouth, throat, etc.
Final Thoughts – Will it Sound Good?
With Speech Synthesizer, you can easily convert text to speech on FL Studio, but unfortunately, it doesn’t give out a best-sounding output.
You’ll have to rely on some effects plugins to make it sound quite realistic, but if you only require an artificial-sounding output, Speech Synthesizer is enough.
There are also some great free and paid text-to-speech converters available. You can try those out if you want something different.
I hope this guide has helped you convert text to speech on FL Studio.
You might also like reading,
Frequently Asked Questions
How to change voice in FL Studio?
You can change the voice on FL Studio using different effects plugins. FL Studio has a lot of stock plugins that you can use to change voice free of cost.
How do I make my voice deeper in FL Studio?
You can make your voice deeper in FL Studio by reducing the pitch. To do this, add a vocal effects plugin like NewTone and turn the pitch knob to a negative value. For a much deeper voice, turn the pitch knob all the way to the left (increase the negative value).