Read Aloud Voices in WORD (they disappeared)

Anonymous
2021-11-30T00:39:13+00:00

After upgrading my laptop to Windows 11, I tried Read Aloud in Word. To my surprise there were several voice options that were not there when I was using Windows 10. Then, after a week of using it to proofread my manuscript, I rebooted my laptop (something I do regularly to ensure updates) and the Read Aloud was ****. I tried to change back to the good voice and there were only the standard three voices (David, Zira, Mark). I worked with Microsoft support, who reinstall my Office 19 twice before finally saying there were only the three voices and I had to live with it.

Was I in some weird twilight zone for a week and not in the real world? What happened to my good Read Aloud voice? and how can I get it back?

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-05-27T20:40:29+00:00

    Thanks Suzanne, I'll keep my eyes open for it..........

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  2. Suzanne S Barnhill 279.4K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2022-05-25T01:54:21+00:00

    The latest word from Microsoft is that "the issue has been fixed and it should be included in the next monthly update (2205). April fork (2205) has started rolling out to Production, so users should start seeing the new build in the coming days."

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  3. Anonymous
    2022-05-17T19:41:52+00:00

    I have discovered that they are only available to subscribers of office 365. I managed to get them back on my PC by reinstalling office from my Microsoft login page. Didn't work on my laptop though, so very strange.

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  4. Anonymous
    2022-05-17T19:30:32+00:00

    Last I heard, they released the new voices with Office 365 updates (the online version of office). Those with Office 2021 and earlier apparently are not going to get it back. [EDGE updates have it]. It's probably a drive toward orphaning the standalone versions of Office before dropping them completely.

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  5. Anonymous
    2022-03-26T23:43:23+00:00

    I forced updates and still don't have the good voices. Still perplexed!

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