[BUG] Read-aloud ignores the selected voice — always plays the same voice regardless of the setting (desktop & web, Windows + Linux)

Preflight Checklist

• [x] I have searched existing issues and this hasn't been reported yet
• [x] This is a single bug report (please file separate reports for different bugs)
• [x] I am using the latest version of Claude Code

What's Wrong?

Summary

Selecting a voice under Settings → General → Voice settings has no effect on the read-aloud ("Play") of chat responses on desktop and web. Read-aloud always uses the same voice, no matter which of the five voices is selected. The preview in the settings plays the correct selected voice, so the setting itself is stored — it is only ignored during actual playback.

Environment

• Claude Code desktop app on Windows 11
• Also reproduced on KDE Linux (KDE Plasma desktop) in Google Chrome. No desktop app is available for that distribution, so Claude was used in the browser there.
• UI and voice language: German
• Mobile app on the same account behaves correctly

Steps to reproduce

1. Settings → General → Voice settings. Select a voice whose preview is male (German UI: "Hell"). Listen to the preview.
2. Have Claude read a chat response aloud. Note the voice.
3. Return to the settings and select a voice whose preview is clearly female (German UI: "Sanft"). Confirm via the preview that it is female.
4. Have Claude read a chat response aloud again.

Expected

Step 4 plays the newly selected voice — the female voice heard in the preview.

Actual

Step 4 plays the exact same male voice as step 2. Switching voices never changes the read-aloud voice. Because the selected voice is female in the preview and the playback is male, this is unambiguous and needs no subjective comparison.

Additional observations

• The preview plays the correct voice for every option, so the selection is stored.
• Changing the voice language (German → English) does change the playback voice. So the language setting is applied to read-aloud, while the voice selection is not.
• On the mobile app, read-aloud matches both the selected voice and its preview.
• The read-aloud voice sounds identical on Windows and on Linux, which argues against a fallback to a local/OS text-to-speech engine.

Possibly related

#72123 and #66111 concern other read-aloud playback problems on desktop. This report is about the wrong voice being used, not about degradation or playback aborting.

What Should Happen?

Read-aloud should use the voice selected under Settings → General → Voice settings — the same voice the settings preview plays, and the same behaviour the mobile app already shows.

Concretely: after selecting a voice whose preview is female, the read-aloud of a chat response should also be female. Currently the selection has no effect on playback at all.

Error Messages/Logs

Steps to Reproduce

1. Open Settings → General → Voice settings.
2. Select a voice whose preview is male (German UI: "Hell"). Play the preview to confirm.
3. Go back to a chat and have Claude read a response aloud. Note the voice.
4. Return to Settings → General → Voice settings and select a voice whose preview is clearly female (German UI: "Sanft"). Play the preview to confirm it is female.
5. Go back to a chat and have Claude read a response aloud again.

Result: step 5 plays the exact same male voice as step 3. The selected voice never changes the playback voice.

Cross-check that isolates it: changing the voice language (German → English) under the same settings section DOES change the playback voice. So the language part of the setting is applied to read-aloud, only the voice selection is ignored.

Claude Model

None

Is this a regression?

No, this never worked

Last Working Version

_No response_

Claude Code Version

1.24012.9.0 (Claude desktop app, MSIX/Store package version — CLI not installed, so claude --version is unavailable)

Platform

Anthropic API

Operating System

Windows

Terminal/Shell

Other

Additional Information

Note on the form fields above: this report is not about the terminal/CLI. It concerns the read-aloud ("Play") button on chat responses in the Claude Code desktop app, and the same behaviour in the browser. "Terminal/Shell" is therefore set to "Other", and "Claude Model" is left at "None" because the bug is independent of the model in use.

On "Is this a regression?": set to "No, this never worked". Read-aloud has never used the selected voice on the desktop for this user — on mobile it has always been correct.