VoiceOver voice not sounding right after iOS 7.1 update

Hi, I have no idea what's going on over there. Have you tried restarting the phone? It's the only thing which comes immediately to mind. I know they changed the sound of the compact voice in 7.1, but I never used it myself so don't think that's the issue. I would recommend a restart of the phone first, and if that doesn't work try resetting voiceover settings.

I have the same voice over issue. I've reset settings and changed thing. Nothing seems to make it go back to what it sounded like before the update. It also makes weird noises when it's reading things. Slight squeaks or pops. It says letters different as well, such as the letter a and h. I'm hoping this can be fixed in later updates.

Hi Helaine, With the noises/pops you speak of, would you characterize the voice as being "choppy"?

It's not just you! It sounds like a robot. I had to change to British. I was getting headaches from the tinny shrillness of default voice. The letter Z and C sound the same. When going into Safari it pronounces as Saw-for-e

I'm also having the same issue. That's quite frustrating. Anyway does anyone know how to switch to the British female voice for VO...? I am not talking about Siri though. Thanks... Shannon.

I've been thinking how much better the US English voice is now. I can't say how, but it just seems far easier to understand.

I actually like the way this new US-English compact Samantha voice sounds. To me, it's better than the older one. I know I might be in the minority here, and yeah the older one probably was what certain people were used to. I'm just saying they made it this way. It's not a bug.

Hi Helaine and all, The Enhanced Quality U.S. English voice should be almost identical in iOS 7.1 as it is in iOS 7. What has changed is the U.S. English compact voice. It is a little closer to the HQ voice now in terms of sound but is definitely more robotic. Are those of you experiencing the choppiness with the voice using the enhanced quality (HQ) voice? I had a problem with the compact voice during the early betas, but it was resolved.

Have you tried re-downloading the HQ voice? Go to Settings\General\Accessibility\VoiceOver\Languages and Dialects. Turn off enhanced quality for U.S. English and turn it back on. The enhanced quality voice should begin re-downloading, which will take a fiew minutes. Please let me know if this fixes the problem.

Are you sure that the compact voice option is on? I haven't tried the compact voice, but I'll try it later. As for the HQ voices, I haven't had any problems with it.

Hello Helaine, Just to confirm that you are indeed using the compact voice and not the HQ voice? The compact voice has indeed been changed in iOS 7.1. The HQ voice, apart from a couple minor inflection changes, has not. Regards, Michael

The Compact voices sound better than they used to, but they also sound kind of metallic. The high quality voices shouldn't. I use Karen on my phone because she sounds the most natural out of the other english voices. It appears the South African and Irish compact voices have no changed. My guess is that Apple got an update to the voices from Nuance since Apple seems to use Nuance exclusively. To the person wanting the female UK voice, that is not possible. For some stupid reason Apple restricts the voices that you can use in iOS. I have no idea why, as all of the Nuance voices are available on the mac. I see no reason why Apple can't let us choose the other voices in each dialect. I'll stop there but I could go on a rant all day about the irritations of iOS voices.

Believe it or not, my favorite "compact" U.S. English voice was that from iOS 3 and iOS 4. Maybe it's just because that was what I got used to when using my first iPhone...but of all the compact voice iterations, that is my favorite. The compact voice in iOS 6 comes in a close second, being lower-pitched like the old iOS 4 voice. The iOS 5 and iOS 7 compact voice was just too high-pitched for my liking, and while iOS 7.1's compact voice is certainly an improvement, I'm not a huge fan of it either.

I never really used any of the compact voices on iOs. Up until iOs 7.1, I thought they all sounded, except the U.S. voice, like they had a cold. But, just from playing around with them now, they sound heaps better. Personally, the enhanced voices sound great to me, and I have never had a choppy problem come up in my 3 and a half years of using the iPhone.

Hi. I'm not having a single issue with using any of the voices in iOS 7.1. Here's my settings so you guys can set them to mine, and see if this won't help things. Note you may have to change a lot of the settings but mine are pretty close to defaults. 1. Select US English Samantha as the default voice. 2. Speaking rate is 55%, please adjust that to whatever fits your ear, remember these are my settings. 3. Speak hints, on. 4. Use pitch change, off. 5. Use sound effects, on. 6. Use compact voice, off. Under languages and dialects... the default dialect is u.s. English. Rotor languages are Australian English, spoken by Karen, she's the hq voice, British English is spoken by Daniel hq. Irish English is spoken by Moira HQ, and Tessa is the south African English HQ female voice. Those are all the settings I use here, so i'm hoping you guys having trouble can maybe use those as something to go on. From what it sounds like the compact voices are being used instead of the HQ ones, so the goal here is to get the hq voices to download. I hope what I posted here is of some help.

Hi. I'm wondering something. Is it true that older versions of iOS had different voices like Serena and Emily? I wonder why Apple changed this? I guess I've come in kind of late, seeing as I got my first iPhone 4 in July 2012 with iOS 5.1.1. So, were there different voices for UK and Australian English? If so I wonder why Apple changed it?

Ok guys, I am passing on some info about this issue. I initially posted on this issue the day of the release. Brief conversation with Michael Hanson about the change of the compact voice on 7.1 with the US English voice. I personally switched to the British voice. I had to switch because I literally was having a physical reaction to the voice. It was making me nauseous and a headache. I guess I'm very sensitive to high pitched whines. I am not a fan of the enhanced voice. That is a personal preference. Not saying one is better over the other. With all this being said, I wrote a letter to Mr. Cook, Mr. Ive, and the accessibility Team. Normally when you contact them, you get a general response. To my surprise, I actually was contacted by the Accessibility team. They wanted specifics to many questions. I gave many examples. I also guided them to this site for some others concerns with this issue. I could only give specifics with my issues with the compact voice. The fact that I know Apple knows of this issue now. For those who are having a hard time with the new compact voice and found no resolution. I would implore you to contact the accessibility team with your specific issues. The more who give examples so they can test. The better it is for everyone. Just be kind. They were very interested, I'm sure that was because I took the time to express my issues in a polite manner. Good luck, and happy emailing!

After emailing Apple back and forth with examples. They emailed me to say it's been passed on to the Speech Group.

I'm having the same problem with the enhanced quality Austrailian voice on my 4s. It's the only voice I'm comfortable withbut I tried the others again, because this is so difficult now. The only voice that is not giving me problems is the Brittish voice but since I have some hearing problems in lower registers, this is also not a good option - it's too close to the range where I have difficulty. I tried downloading the voice several times, tried the compact voice, and can't tolerate either of them. The regular voice I am using sounds, I don't know exactly, but a little mushy, but it's the best I can do.