praat

Praat is a free software package for phonetics and speech analysis. It was developed by Paul Boersma and David Weenink at the University of Amsterdam and released publicly in the 1990s. Praat runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux, and is distributed under the GNU General Public License, making it freely available for research and teaching.

Praat provides tools for the acoustic analysis and synthesis of speech signals. Users can view and measure time–frequency representations such as spectrograms, extract pitch (F0) tracks, estimate formant frequencies, compute intensity, and analyze voice quality. The program supports manual and automatic segmentation and labeling of data with TextGrid annotation files, enabling precise phonetic analysis and corpus work. It also includes synthesis capabilities to generate sounds from parameters and supports a range of standard audio formats for import and export.

A distinctive feature of Praat is its built-in scripting language, which allows repetitive analyses to be automated and customized workflows to be shared. Practitioners use Praat for research in phonetics, speech perception, language development, and clinical phonology, as well as in teaching to illustrate concepts in acoustic phonetics.

Praat has a long-standing user community and comprehensive documentation, including a user manual and numerous tutorials. The software continues to be maintained by its authors and contributors, with frequent updates addressing analysis methods, compatibility, and usability.