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How do you convert text to a voice message on iPhone?

Type or paste the message in TTS, tap the tray-with-arrow icon next to Stop, and the app saves it as an M4A spoken by the iOS voice you picked. The player that opens has a share button: choose Messages, WhatsApp or any app that takes audio, and the clip goes out as an audio file.

4 min read · Updated 2026-09-16

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This works well for a message that can't be said out loud, such as directions sent from a quiet train. Typing takes a minute, the export takes a couple of seconds, and the share sheet does the rest.

One thing to know before you start. What arrives on the other phone is an audio file attachment, not the voice note you get by holding the microphone button inside a chat. It plays the same way, with a tap, but it looks different, and the voice is an iOS voice, not yours.

Steps: from typed text to a sent voice message

  1. Open TTS and type or paste the message into Type or paste text to read aloud….
  2. Open Voice and pick a voice in the language of the message. The ones marked Premium or HD sound the least robotic, if your iPhone has them installed.
  3. Move Speed a notch below 1.00x if the message has numbers, codes or an address; the listener cannot scroll back up to reread.
  4. Tap the tray-with-arrow icon at the left of the Stop / Speak row. Exporting audio… shows briefly, then a player opens.
  5. Play it once in the player to check it.
  6. Tap the share button at the top right, pick the chat app and the contact, and send.

Worked example: one message, start to finish

Here is an example message, 175 characters with spaces: "Hi Ana, I am running about twenty minutes late. The keys are under the blue pot by the front door, and the code for the side gate is four, one, nine, seven. Put the kettle on."

Free plan: 1,000 characters a day, counted every time you press Speak or save
StepCharacters usedLeft today
Start of the day01,000
Speak once to hear how it sounds175825
Save it as audio (tray-with-arrow icon)175650
Play the saved clip in the player, any number of times0650

Previewing with Speak costs just as much as the export does. If the text is clean, skip the preview and listen in the player instead: playing a file you already saved does not count.

The gate code is written as words on purpose. Typed as 4197, an iOS voice may say "four thousand one hundred ninety-seven", and that is not what you want someone to punch into a keypad.

File size is small: the clip is AAC at 128 kbps, so 20 seconds of speech is about 320 KB and 45 seconds about 720 KB. Any chat app takes that without complaint.

What is free and what is not

  • Free: every voice installed on your iPhone or iPad, Speed and Pitch, saving as M4A and sharing, up to 1,000 characters a day.
  • Each rewarded ad you finish adds 500 characters for that day; the count resets at 00:00 UTC.
  • A message longer than what you have left is refused whole, with the Need More Characters alert. It is never cut to fit.
  • PRO removes the daily limit and the ads. Nothing else about exporting changes.

What it cannot do

It cannot speak in your own voice or clone anyone else's, and there are no AI or cloud voices: only the ones iOS has on the device. It does not send anything by itself, there is no button that posts straight into a chat. The format is M4A, never MP3.

The main source of friction is a lost file: closing the player out of habit before sharing puts the clip out of reach. Share first, close second.

Questions and answers

Can you send a voice message via text on iPhone?
Yes, as an audio file. Save the text as an M4A in TTS, then use the player's share button and pick Messages or another chat app. The other person taps it to play.
Is there a free text to voice message app?
TTS is free to download and lets you save up to 1,000 characters a day as audio, plus 500 for each rewarded ad you watch to the end. A short message of 150 to 300 characters fits easily.
Can I convert text to a voice memo?
TTS makes an M4A file, the same audio format voice memos use, but it does not add it to the Voice Memos app. Save it to Files from the share sheet if you want to keep it.
Are these AI voices?
No. They are the speech voices built into iOS, running on your device. Premium and HD voices sound more natural and are downloaded in the iOS Settings app, not inside TTS.

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