Read Aloud function on Microsoft Edge grays out entire screen on PDF Documents (Windows 11)

Victor A 15 Reputation points
2026-09-01T06:03:01.74+00:00

The Read Aloud function on my HP Laptop (Windows 11) doesn't work properly when I use it on PDF documents. When I click the passage I want it to read, it loads for a few seconds the screen goes completely gray with the only non-gray section being the sentence it's reading. This completely disables all functions on the tab Read Aloud is using and I can't properly click on another passage to read while the voice is playing like with regular non-PDF pages or even scroll up and down. The only thing I can use on the tab is the Read Aloud settings. This wasn't an issue beforehand as I could manipulate the Read Aloud function freely on both regular tabs and PDFs. I don't know how to fix it and every time I looked up how to resolve the problem I get no answers. Any help would be much appreciated.Screenshot 2026-08-31 225213

Microsoft Edge | Read PDFs | Windows 11
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  1. Emma1-N 11,450 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator
    2026-09-02T03:15:31.3766667+00:00

    Welcome Victor A,

    Thank you for the detailed description and screenshot. From the screenshot, it appears that Edge is dimming the PDF page except for the text currently being read.  

    Please try these quick checks: 

    1, Open Edge and go to Settings > About Microsoft Edge

    • Let Edge check for updates automatically.
    • Install any available update and restart Edge.

    2, Test Read Aloud with a different PDF file.

    • Preferably use a text-based PDF rather than a scanned document.
    • Let us know whether the screen still turns gray on every PDF or only on certain files.

    3, Open an InPrivate window (Ctrl+Shift+N).

    • Open the same PDF.
    • Start Read Aloud and check whether the dimmed-screen behavior still occurs.

    4, Let me know approximately when this started:

    • After a recent Edge update?
    • After a Windows update?
    • Or did it begin without any known change?

    If the answer is helpful, please click "Yes". If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment".   

    Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.  

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