<say-as>
The <say-as>
tag is supported by generative, long-form, neural, and standard TTS engines. Note, however, that
if Amazon Polly is using a neural voice and encounters the <say-as>
tag with the characters option at runtime, the affected sentence
will be synthesized using the related standard voice. However, the affected
sentence will still be billed as if it uses a neural voice.
Use the <say-as> tag with the
interpret-as attribute to tell Amazon Polly how to say
certain characters, words, and numbers. This enables you to
provide additional context to eliminate any ambiguity on how
Amazon Polly should render the text.
The <say-as> tag uses one attribute,
interpret-as, which uses a number of possible available
values. Each uses the same syntax:
<say-as interpret-as="value">[text to be interpreted]</say-as>The following values are available with
interpret-as:
-
charactersorspell-out: Spells out each letter of the text, as in a-b-c.Note
This option is not currently supported for neural voices. If you're using a neural voice and this SSML code is encountered by Amazon Polly at run-time, the affected sentence will be synthesized using the related standard voice. Please note, however, that this sentence will still be billed as if it uses a neural voice.
-
cardinalornumber: Interprets the numerical text as a cardinal number, as in 1,234. -
ordinal: Interprets the numerical text as an ordinal number, as in 1,234th. -
digits: Spells out each digit individually, as in 1-2-3-4. -
fraction: Interprets the numerical text as a fraction. This works for both common fractions such as 3/20, and mixed fractions, such as 2 ½. See below for more information. -
unit: Interprets a numerical text as a measurement. The value should be either a number or a fraction followed by a unit with no space in between as in1/2inch, or by just a unit, as in1meter. -
date: Interprets the text as a date. The format of the date must be specified with the format attribute. See below for more information. -
time: Interprets the numerical text as duration, in minutes and seconds, as in1'21". -
address: Interprets the text as part of a street address. -
expletive: "Beeps out" the content included within the tag. -
telephone: Interprets the numerical text as a 7-digit or 10-digit telephone number, as in2025551212. You can also use this value for handle telephone extensions, as in2025551212x345. See below for more information.Note
Currently the
telephoneoption is not available for all languages. However, it is available for voices speaking English language variants (en-AU, en-GB, en-IN, en-US, and en-GB-WLS), Spanish language variants (es-ES, es-MX, and es-US), French language variants (fr-FR and fr-CA), and Portuguese variants (pt-BR and pt-PT), as well as German (de-DE), Italian (it-IT), Japanese (ja-JP), and Russian (ru-RU). It should also be noted that in some cases, languages such as Arabic (arb) automatically handle the number set as a telephone number and so don't actually implement thetelephoneSSML tag.
Fractions
Amazon Polly interprets values within the say-as tag
that have the interpret-as="fraction" attribute as
common fractions. The following is the syntax for
fractions:
-
Fraction
Syntax:
cardinal number/cardinal number, such as 2/9.For example:
<say-as interpret-as="fraction">2/9</say-as>is pronounced "two ninths." -
Non-negative Mixed Number
Syntax:
cardinal number+cardinal number/cardinal number, such as 3+1/2.For example,
<say-as interpret-as="fraction">3+1/2</say-as>is pronounced "three and a half."Note
There must be a
+between the "3" and the "1/2". Amazon Polly doesn't support a mixed number without the+, such as "3 1/2".
Dates
When interpret-as is set to date,
you also need to indicate the format of the date.
This uses the following syntax:
<say-as interpret-as="date" format="format">[date]</say-as>
For example:
<speak>
I was born on <say-as interpret-as="date" format="mdy">12-31-1900</say-as>.
</speak>The following formats can be used with the date
attribute.
-
mdy: Month-day-year. -
dmy: Day-month-year. -
ymd: Year-month-day. -
md: Month-day. -
dm: Day-month. -
ym: Year-month. -
my: Month-year. -
d: Day. -
m: Month. -
y: Year. -
yyyymmdd: Year-month-day. If you use this format, you can make Amazon Polly skip parts of the date using question marks.For example, Amazon Polly renders the following as "September 22nd":
<say-as interpret-as="date">????0922</say-as>Formatis not needed.
Telephone
Amazon Polly attempts to interpret the text you provide correctly
based on the text’s formatting even without the
<say-as> tag. For example, if your text
includes "202-555-1212," Amazon Polly interprets it as a 10-digit
telephone number and says each digit individually, with a brief
pause for each dash. In this case, you don't need to use
<say-as interpret-as="telephone">.
However, if you provide the text “2025551212” and want Amazon Polly to
say it as a phone number, you would specify <say-as
interpret-as="telephone">.
The logic for interpreting each element is language-specific. For example, US and UK English differ in how phone numbers are pronounced (in UK English, sequences of the same digit are grouped together, as in "double five" or "triple four"). To see the difference, test the following example with a US voice and with a UK voice:
<speak> Richard's number is <say-as interpret-as="telephone">2122241555</say-as> </speak>
