Show HN: Orate – On-device neural text-to-speech queue for Mac

7/21/2026 at 10:40:21 PM

It would be nice to have a sample of the audio quality and voice(s) it uses on the website so we know what it will sound like.

-- Edit:

I installed it, ran it and got the first time wizard, granted permissions and hit continue and it just exits without any other message or screen. It isn't in the menu bar. I run it again and get the same. It says the permissions are granted already the second time though.

I like the interface on the website a lot, so I would love to use this. Thoughts?

by greggh

7/21/2026 at 11:44:38 PM

I experience the same. M5 Pro MBP, 64gb RAM.

If I click "skip" on the wizard, it gets 1 screen further then crashes with no feedback on next interaction.

by armsaw

7/22/2026 at 3:36:19 PM

Okay, 0.1.9 is out now and should fix the issue... I also added a way to report crashes, so IF it still gives you issues, let me know and please report the crash

by bherms

7/22/2026 at 6:07:20 PM

Tried it out - tested on a few bits of text and it reads 1 sentence then goes non-responsive and pegs a cpu core to 100%. It doesn't crash so I don't have opportunity to report. I have to force quit the app manually.

by armsaw

7/22/2026 at 1:39:04 AM

On it! Pushed out a fix for something else earlier and didn’t go through a clean install to test. Should have a fix shortly. Just getting off a plane though. Will follow up when I have it nailed down.

by bherms

7/21/2026 at 11:05:31 PM

Can you paste your system specs here for me? It's running for me just fine and on a few other laptops here, but I am curious if there's something on your laptop that might be giving issues... It does require Mac w/ Apple M1+. Happy to debug and get it working for you!

by bherms

7/22/2026 at 12:39:03 AM

Mac mini m4 16gb, latest updates.

by greggh

7/22/2026 at 3:35:25 PM

Okay, 0.1.9 is out now and should fix the issue... I also added a way to report crashes, so IF it still gives you issues, let me know and please report the crash

by bherms

7/22/2026 at 1:37:31 AM

On it! I’ll ping you when I have a culprit

by bherms

7/21/2026 at 11:12:56 PM

Oh also, on the website, the first preview in the hero does give a real synthesized example I pulled using the app! Its not clear that the other screenshots are not interactive

by bherms

7/21/2026 at 10:40:49 PM

Seems great, a keyboard shortcut for reading any text is nice and frictionless. I'd love to see a Linux version.

by womble2

7/21/2026 at 10:16:25 PM

Cool, I’ll give it a try! OCR for printed stuff, device sync and character voices (for fiction) would be killer.

by monkellipse

7/21/2026 at 11:06:23 PM

The Chatterbox HD plugin actually does AI voice cloning, but I didn't expose it yet. That's a great idea to see if it can do different voices and I could clone some popular ones. Device sync is coming soon!

by bherms

7/22/2026 at 10:45:19 AM

Surprised at how little traction this has gotten here, I reckon I could get a lot of use out of this once the iOS app comes along - Instapaper that I can use while walking the dogs.

by drcongo

7/22/2026 at 3:11:42 PM

Yep, I'm on it... Should be ready in about a week!

by bherms