Read Text for Claude Code
Hear Claude Code's replies read aloud, and right-click any text in VS Code to have it read to you. It uses the voices already on your computer, so there's nothing to sign up for and no API key.
Not affiliated with or endorsed by Anthropic. Claude and Claude Code are trademarks of Anthropic.
Features
- Claude's replies, read aloud. When a Claude Code session in VS Code finishes its turn, its final reply is spoken. Markdown is cleaned up first: headings, bullets, bold and link syntax are dropped, links are read by their text, and code blocks are announced as "code block" rather than read character by character.
- Read Text from the right-click menu. Highlight text, right-click, and choose Read Text. It works in:
- Editors, including markdown and plain-text files. Code is read as written.
- The terminal.
- Webview panels, including the Claude Code chat panel and markdown previews.
- Stop at any time. While text is being read, Stop Reading appears in the same right-click menus, and the status-bar icon becomes a stop button.
- Your choice of voice and speed.
Getting started
- Install the extension.
- A speaker icon labelled Claude appears on the right of the status bar. Click it to turn automatic reading on or off.
- Send Claude Code a prompt. When the turn finishes, you'll hear the reply.
Commands (Ctrl+Shift+P, category Read Aloud):
- Read Text: reads the highlighted text in the editor.
- Read Last Response: reads Claude's most recent reply in this workspace again.
- Stop Reading
- Choose Voice: lists your installed voices and plays a sample.
- Turn Auto-Read On/Off
To stop or read with a key, bind claudeReadAloud.stop or claudeReadAloud.readSelection in Keyboard Shortcuts.
Settings
| Setting |
Default |
What it does |
claudeReadAloud.enabled |
true |
Read new replies automatically. |
claudeReadAloud.mode |
final |
final: only the reply at the end of each turn. all: also the short notes Claude writes between steps. |
claudeReadAloud.vscodeSessionsOnly |
true |
Ignore sessions from the Claude Code terminal CLI and the desktop app. |
claudeReadAloud.onlyThisWorkspace |
true |
Only read sessions inside this window's folders, so several windows don't talk over each other. |
claudeReadAloud.stopOnNewPrompt |
true |
Stop talking when you send a new prompt. |
claudeReadAloud.readCodeBlocks |
false |
Read code blocks instead of announcing them. |
claudeReadAloud.maxCharacters |
0 |
Cut long replies short (0 = no limit). |
claudeReadAloud.rate |
0 |
Speed from -10 to 10. |
claudeReadAloud.voice |
"" |
Voice name, or empty for the system default. |
How it works
Claude Code saves each session to a transcript file under ~/.claude/projects (or $CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR/projects). The extension watches those files on your computer, picks out each finished reply, and hands the text to your system's speech engine:
| Platform |
Speech engine |
| Windows |
Windows speech (System.Speech, through PowerShell) |
| macOS |
say |
| Linux |
espeak-ng (install it from your package manager) |
Privacy: everything stays on your computer. Nothing is sent over the network.
Webview panels: VS Code doesn't let one extension read text highlighted in another extension's panel. So for webviews, Read Text copies the selection, reads it from the clipboard, and then puts your previous clipboard text back. If an image was on your clipboard, it's replaced.
Known limitations
- Tested on Windows. macOS and Linux support is included but hasn't been tested yet.
- Remote windows (WSL, SSH, Dev Containers) aren't supported yet.
- On Windows, only voices that support the classic Windows speech API are available, such as Microsoft David and Microsoft Zira. The newer "natural" voices used by Narrator aren't.
- Claude Code's transcript format isn't a published interface. If a Claude Code update changes it, automatic reading may stop working until this extension is updated. Read Text keeps working either way.
