Fixing Mispronunciations in Text to Speech

Text to speech mispronounces the same categories every time, names, acronyms, units, and anything borrowed from another language. A short pronunciation pass before export catches almost all of it.

The mistakes are predictable, which is good news. Once you know the patterns, you can scan a script in two minutes and fix the words that would otherwise embarrass the whole upload.

The usual suspects

Proper nouns lead the list. A surname with an unexpected vowel, a brand that insists on an odd stress, a place name the engine has never seen. Acronyms are next, because the reader guesses whether to spell them out or say them as a word, and it often guesses wrong.

Numbers, dates, and units trip it up as well. A model built for one locale reads a date in the wrong order, or says a measurement in a way your audience would never say it. All of these are fixable, but only if you look before you publish.

Two ways to fix a word

The first is respelling, where you rewrite the word the way it should sound for that engine. It works, and it is quick, but the respelling can look wrong in your captions if you are not careful. Keep the respelled version in a separate field if your tool allows it.

The second is a pronunciation dictionary, where you give the correct form once and the engine applies it everywhere. This is more work up front and pays off across an entire series. Choose the dictionary for any word you will say more than twice.

A mispronounced name is the fastest way to lose the trust of the person who owns it. Two minutes of checking beats a re-upload and an apology.

Build a personal list

Keep a running file of every word you have had to fix. Channel names, recurring guests, product terms, your own handle. Over a few months this list becomes the most valuable document in your production folder.

Test the list by running a short script that contains all of them. If the read comes back clean, you can publish with confidence. If one breaks, you fix the entry, not the habit.

Key takeaways

• Scan for names, acronyms, units, and foreign words before every export.
• Respelling is fast, a pronunciation dictionary is durable.
• Keep a running list of problem words and reuse it every episode.
• Test the list against a short script before a big publish.