Best Apps to Read and Listen to a Book at the Same Time: 7 Options Compared

HushBook is the best app to read and listen to a book at the same time because it highlights every word as the narrator speaks in any audiobook you own, free. If you buy your books from Amazon and own both the audiobook and its Kindle ebook, Audible Read & Listen covers that case.

Prices and features below were checked on October 30, 2026 on each app's official site, help center or store listing. Prices are in US dollars unless a market is named.

What is the best app to read and listen to a book at the same time?

For most people, HushBook. It is the one app here that puts word-by-word text on any audiobook you own, read by the original narrator, and the read-along is free for every book. The other six each cover a narrower case:

• Books on Audible and Kindle, if you own both editions: Audible Read & Listen.
• Streaming in six European markets: Storytel Synced Listening.
• PDFs, documents or web pages: Speechify or ElevenReader, in AI voices.
• A home server and both editions of a book: Storyteller.
• A young child: Libby read-alongs.

A 2012 meta-analysis of 57 studies by Adesope and Nesbit found that people who saw and heard words together learned more than people who only heard them. A 2013 study by Varao Sousa, Carriere and Smilek found that listening alone led to more mind wandering than reading aloud or reading silently. Our guide to whether reading along with an audiobook helps covers the rest of the research. If you are choosing for a reader with dyslexia, see the best audiobook apps for dyslexia.

Is there an app where you can read and listen to books at the same time for free?

Yes. HushBook is free to download, with no account and no ads, and the read-along costs nothing for any book you add. It has free public-domain classics built in, from LibriVox and the Internet Archive, so you can start without owning a single audiobook. Our guide to free read-along audiobooks shows where to find more free recordings, and the best LibriVox apps compares the players for that catalogue.

The other free routes come with conditions. Libby read-alongs need a library card and are aimed at developing readers. Storyteller needs your own server. ElevenReader's free plan gives "10 hours of text to audio every month", and Speechify's offers "10 robotic sounding voices", both reading text rather than an audiobook. Audible and Storytel are paid.

Can you read and listen at the same time on Kindle and Audible?

Yes, on eligible titles, if you own both editions. Audible's help center says that to use Read & Listen "you'll need both the audiobook and Kindle eBook in your Audible and Kindle libraries", and its Read & Listen page adds: "If you only have the audiobook, the toggle won't appear." Audible calls the highlighted mode immersion reading.

Audible expanded the feature on October 26, 2026, to more than 800,000 English and German titles with a Read & Listen badge. It is live in the US, UK, Germany and Australia and rolling out to Canada, India, France, Italy, Spain, Japan and Brazil. The announcement says "all customers in these countries will be able to follow along with highlighted text as they listen", but Audible's help pages, updated in October 2026, still list the Kindle ebook as a requirement, so plan on buying both.

For setup steps and what to do if you own only one edition, see can you read along with Audible. For books from outside Amazon, our Whispersync alternative page covers the options.

What is the best immersive reading app?

Immersion reading is Amazon's name for reading an ebook while its audiobook plays, with the words highlighted; what is immersive reading explains the term.

For most readers it is HushBook: the same highlighted read-along on audiobooks you already own, transcribed on your phone, with no Kindle ebook needed. If you buy your books from Amazon and own both editions, Audible, or the Kindle app, covers that case with Read & Listen. Storyteller does it for people who run their own server.

Is there an app that highlights words as an audiobook plays?

Yes. HushBook highlights each word as the narrator says it in any audiobook file you add, and in its free classics. Audible highlights the Kindle text on Read & Listen titles: "The text highlights as the narrator reads." Libby highlights the words in some children's read-alongs, Storyteller syncs your ebook to the narration on your own server, and Storytel shows synced text on thousands of titles in six markets.

Speechify and ElevenReader highlight words too, but there the voice is AI reading a text, not a narrator's recording. On Spotify, see can you read along with Spotify audiobooks. For how audiobook text gets made, see audiobook with text and read-along audiobooks.

HushBook: best for reading along with any audiobook you own, free

HushBook is a free read-along audiobook app for iPhone and Android that highlights every word as the narrator speaks. It works with audiobooks you already own, transcribed on your phone. No Kindle ebook needed.

• Word-by-word highlighting synced to the narration, at any speed from 0.5x to 3x
• Your own MP3 and M4B files, transcribed on the device; it reads M4B, MP3, AAC, WAV, FLAC, OGG, OPUS, AIFF, MKA and ALAC, and several files import as one book, one chapter per file
• Free public-domain classics built in, from the LibriVox and Internet Archive catalogue, in six languages
• No account, no ads and no cloud upload
• Works offline after a one-time engine download

HushBook also syncs your own EPUB, PDF, MOBI or TXT ebook to the audio so the real book text lights up, and its Universal engine transcribes audiobooks in ninety-nine languages. Reading profiles for Dyslexia & ADHD, Low Vision and Focused Reader set up fonts such as OpenDyslexic, Lexend and Atkinson Hyperlegible, spacing and colour overlays.

Price: Free to download. No account, no ads.

Get HushBook for iPhone or Android

Audible Read & Listen: Kindle text on books bought from Amazon

Audible's help center says "Immersion reading lets you read and listen to a book at the same time."

• Professional narration with the Kindle ebook text highlighted
• More than 800,000 English and German titles, live in four countries and rolling out to seven more
• Immersion reading in the Audible app on iPhone, iPad, Android phones and tablets, Fire tablets with Fire OS 8 and later, and Mac
• Discounts on the audiobook for eligible Kindle ebooks you already own

Price: you buy the audiobook and the Kindle ebook. Audible Standard is $8.99 a month and Premium $14.95 a month, as of October 30, 2026.

Catch: both editions must be for the same edition of the title and on the same Amazon account. Immersion reading also needs a connection, because "the eBook text loads from the internet in the Audible app", though some pages are saved for offline reading.

HushBook needs no Kindle ebook: it makes the text from the audiobook you already own, right on your phone.

Audible Read & Listen

Storytel Synced Listening: synced text on some titles, in six European markets

Storytel's Swedish page describes Synced Listening as a way to read and listen at the same time.

• Synced text and audio on "thousands of titles", with more added continuously
• Advertised on Storytel's app-feature pages in Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, the Netherlands and Bulgaria
• Pitched at people learning a language, wanting help with concentration or checking a spelling
• First rolled out in Sweden on September 24, 2025, on titles from publishers who opted in

Price: in Sweden, from 99 kr a month (Flex, 20 hours a month) to 249 kr a month (Unlimited), as of October 30, 2026.

Catch: Storytel Group says that "In North America, Storytel operates under the brand Audiobooks.com", and of the 21 Storytel country pages we checked, only these six mention Synced Listening. It covers thousands of titles, out of a catalogue Storytel's Swedish site puts at 1.5 million stories.

HushBook is not tied to a catalogue: any audiobook file you own gets word-by-word text, in ninety-nine languages with its Universal engine.

Storytel app features (Sweden)

Speechify: AI voices reading your documents

Speechify's App Store listing says it lets you "listen to docs, articles, PDFs, email, and various other formats".

• AI voices reading text you bring: PDFs, docs, web pages and photos of printed pages
• Text highlighted word for word as the AI voice reads
• Apps for iPhone, Android, Mac and Windows, plus a web app and Chrome and Edge extensions
• Premium adds 1,000+ voices, 60+ languages and speeds up to 5x

Price: Free plan; Premium $29 a month or $139 billed yearly, as of October 30, 2026.

Catch: the voice is synthetic, not an audiobook narrator. The free plan has "10 robotic sounding voices", speeds "up to 1.5x" and "Text to speech features only".

HushBook keeps the human narrator and every word highlighted, at any speed from 0.5x to 3x, free.

Speechify. For more text-to-speech tools set against human narration, see our Speechify alternatives.

ElevenReader: AI voices reading your ebooks and files

ElevenReader, from ElevenLabs, reads books, PDFs and articles aloud in AI voices.

• Voices "produced with ElevenLabs": 1,000+ voices in 30+ languages
• Imports PDF, DOCX, EPUB, Markdown and TXT files, article links and scanned images
• Text highlighting and speeds from 0.25x to 4x, per its App Store listing
• Ultra adds offline downloads and "20 hours of premium titles each month" from "200K+ premium audiobooks"

Price: free with 10 hours of text to audio a month; Ultra $11 a month, or $8.25 a month billed annually, as of October 30, 2026.

Catch: the voice is AI reading text, not an audiobook recording. Free hours are "used only when you generate new audio from your personal content".

HushBook plays the real narrator's recording and lights up each word as it is spoken.

ElevenReader

Storyteller: a self-hosted server, for people who own both editions

Storyteller is "a self-hosted platform for automatically aligning ebooks and audiobooks for immersive reading."

• Aligns audiobooks and ebooks you already own, for what it calls guided narration
• Produces "EPUB 3 compliant ebook files"
• Server published as a Docker image; reader apps on the App Store and Google Play
• Open source under the MIT License, with books that "stay on your hardware"

Price: Free and open source, with donations through Open Collective.

Catch: you run the server yourself and need both the ebook and the audiobook. The apps ask for "your server URL", and downloads need a login to that server.

HushBook needs no server and no ebook: transcription runs on your phone, with no account and no cloud upload.

Storyteller

Libby read-alongs: narrated picture books for young readers

OverDrive describes read-alongs as "narrated ebooks that are supported in Libby and on your OverDrive website", and Libby's App Store listing offers "interactive read-alongs with your kids".

• Professional narration
• "Text highlighted as the narrator reads (offered by some publishers)"
• Automatic page turning, two-page picture books, and narration speed and volume controls
• Free with a library card: "Yes, Libby is completely free."

Price: Free with a participating library card.

Catch: read-alongs are aimed at developing readers. Libby's help center says "Audiobooks in Libby can't be transferred to MP3 players or iPods", so its audiobooks stay in Libby. More in can Libby read to you.

HushBook reads along with adult audiobooks you own, in your own MP3 and M4B files, with no library card needed.

Libby

How we chose

We ranked the apps by how well they let you read and hear the same book at once:

1. Text in sync with the voice, and highlighted
2. A recorded narrator rather than a synthetic voice
3. Where the text comes from, and whether you buy the book twice
4. Files you already own
5. Price and what the free tier includes
6. Where it is available

We read each app's official site, help center and App Store or Google Play listing on October 30, 2026, and quoted them where we could. We did not test the competing apps on a phone for this post. HushBook is our app, so we held it to the same checks and took its facts from its App Store listing and this site.

We also looked at Voice Dream Reader, a text-to-speech app whose App Store listing says the "Spoken word is highlighted" and lists "Audiobooks in MP3, MP4 or zipped MP3 format". It requires a subscription, with a free trial for new users and in-app purchases from $4.99 a month. We found no claim that it highlights the words of an audiobook recording, so it is not ranked.

What we could not confirm

• Whether Storytel's Synced Listening highlights each word or the current passage. Its pages say only "perfectly synced text and audio".
• Storytel prices outside Sweden, and whether Synced Listening is on every Storytel plan.
• Who narrates the premium audiobooks in ElevenReader Ultra, a person or an AI voice, and whether its text highlighting covers them.
• Whether Audible's October 26, 2026 wording means the audiobook alone will be enough. Its help pages say both editions are needed, so this post follows them.
• How many read-alongs your library carries.

Sources

• Audible newsroom (October 26, 2026), "Audible's Read & Listen Experience Comes to More Listeners Around the Globe"
• Audible Help, "Learn about immersion reading"
• Audible Help, "Learn about Read & Listen"
• Audible, Read & Listen
• Audible membership plans
• Storytel app features: Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Netherlands, Bulgaria
• Storytel press release (September 24, 2025), "Storytel launches innovative product features to elevate the user experience"
• Storytel Sweden subscriptions
• Storytel Group, Markets
• Speechify pricing
• Speechify
• Speechify on the App Store
• ElevenReader pricing
• ElevenReader
• ElevenReader on the App Store
• Storyteller
• Storyteller docs, "Storyteller apps"
• Storyteller docs, "Self-hosting"
• Storyteller Reader on the App Store
• Storyteller on Google Play
• Storyteller source code (MIT License)
• OverDrive, "OverDrive Read-Alongs"
• Libby Help, "What is Libby?"
• Libby Help, "Can I transfer audiobooks to an MP3 player with Libby?"
• Libby on the App Store
• Voice Dream on the App Store
• HushBook on the App Store
• HushBook on Google Play
• Adesope and Nesbit (2012), "Verbal redundancy in multimedia learning environments: A meta-analysis", Journal of Educational Psychology
• Varao Sousa, Carriere and Smilek (2013), "The way we encounter reading material influences how frequently we mind wander", Frontiers in Psychology