Adding a pause between sentences - Amazon Polly

Adding a pause between sentences

<s>

This tag is supported by generative, long-form, neural, and standard TTS formats.

To add a pause between lines or sentences in your text, use the <s> tag. Using this tag has the same effect as:

  • Ending a sentence with a period (.)

  • Specifying a pause with <break strength="strong"/>

Unlike the <break> tag, the <s> tag encloses the sentence. This is useful for synthesizing speech that is organized in lines, rather than sentence, such as poetry.

In the following example, the <s> tag creates a short pause after both the first and second sentences. The final sentence has no <s> tag, but it is also followed by a short pause because it ends with a period.

<speak> <s>Mary had a little lamb</s> <s>Whose fleece was white as snow</s> And everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go. </speak>