Scene Speak vs GoTalk® NOW LITE
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Scene Speak
Create interactive visual scenes and social stories by adding custom images with active "hotspots" that can play sounds, display text, or link to other scenes. Organize scenes into themed "books" for enhanced communication and learning.
- Add custom images
- Record own voice or use TTS
- Multiple interactive hotspots
- Create social stories in books
- Animated text
- Page locking
- File sharing and iCloud backup
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Scene Speak is versatile customizable app that provides a framework on the iPad to create interactive visual scene displays and social stories. Scene Speak allows an image to be edited with active “hotspots”. A hotspot is an area of the screen that can “sound areas” that can be selected and used as a means of communication. An image can have multiple “hotspots” that can be edited to add sound, text labels or link to another visual scene. In addition, Images with text can be then can be added into “books” by theme or area of interest. Scene Speak is a wonderful communication tool for those with Autism, Aphasia, Apraxia, developmental disabilities or anyone wanting to enhance receptive language or visual memory. FEATURES INCLUDE: * ADD CUSTOM IMAGES from your home computer, the iPad camera or from the built in Internet search feature to create contextually relevant scenes. * RECORD YOUR OWN VOICE to the “sound areas” or use one of the five preloaded voices in the TTS feature. * MULTIPLE HOTSPOTS can be added to a scene. Hotspots can include: sound, text labels or can link to another scene. * CREATE SOCIAL STORIES by grouping scenes into books. * TEXT CAN BE ANIMATED by recording voice in-sync to the color change of text (text changes from black to red and back to black). * PAGES CAN BE LOCKED /unlocked as needed to prevent user from going to another page. * FILE SHARING: you can backup your saved "Books" and "VSD's" on your home computer or you can share them with a person with the same application. * BACKUP AND RESTORE VIA iCLOUD to prevent loss of created scenes or share saved information to devices on the same iTunes account. * PASSWORD PROTECTED SETTINGS MENU to prevent access to editing features and settings. How does it work? Personalized mages can be uploaded to the app. from your home computer or through an online image search. The images can then be resized and active “sound areas” can be added. The application allows both the number and size of the “sound areas” to be customized. Spoken messages can be added to the “sound areas” by using the Text-To-Speech feature, with one of five preloaded voices, or you can record your own voice to the “sound areas”. User can also add text to the sound area as a way of reinforcing receptive language acquisition. A scene can also be linked to another scene via the hotspot. This creates a unique opportunity to create a scene based communication system for those with communication delays. In addition, a scene can have text added directly to the bottom of a page. Once a visual scene is created with active “hotspots” or text, scenes can be added into “Books”. Books can be created and images grouped into the book by a specific theme or area of interest. Multiple books can be created within the book library and as many visual scenes as needed added into the “book”. For example: you may want to create a “Book” titled “My Home”. Within that book may want to include images of different rooms in the home. Within those images you can add “sound areas” to label different objects or people that are represented in those images. A bedroom scene may say, “go to bed” when the bed is touched or “read a book” when a bookcase is touched. * The app. comes preloaded with eleven generic scenes that can be edited and sound areas added. Scenes include: Kitchen Bedroom Child’s Bedroom Living room Bathroom Park Doctor’s office “What Hurts?” (Boy, girl, man, woman).
GoTalk® NOW LITE
This communication app helps individuals with speech difficulties create personalized pages for expression. It offers adjustable layouts, recorded speech, text-to-speech, and an included symbol set. Additional features and unlimited pages are available through in-app purchases.
- Personalized communication pages
- Adjustable page layouts
- Recorded and text-to-speech capabilities
- Included symbol set
- Multiple page styles (Standard, Express, Scene)
- Multimedia integration (video, music)
- Full-feature scanning
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Attainment has been making augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) tools for 25 years. Our experience is front and center in GoTalk NOW LITE, a communication app that introduces you to the flexibility, ease of use, and power of Attainment’s popular GoTalk NOW. GoTalk NOW LITE is a fully functional augmentative communication app for those who have difficulty speaking. Create up to three personalized communication pages in this free app! GoTalk NOW LITE has all the essentials of an effective AAC app, like adjustable page layouts, customizable navigation, recorded and text-to-speech capabilities, and an included symbol set. If you need more Communication Pages or the ability to share, simply upgrade your GoTalk NOW LITE to full GoTalk NOW Features via an in-app purchase. The new LITE offers three styles of communication pages: Standard, Express, and Scene. In Standard pages, the action occurs when the location is pressed. In Express pages, recorded or text-to-speech messages build in a speech bar and play in sequence when the bar is pressed. Scene pages are built around a single photo or image. When you arrange invisible hotspots over people or objects in the photo, the hotspots play speech, music, or videos! Feel free to mix and match pages within a communication book. Create a communication book with unique settings and up to 5 pages in length. Envision the impact of blending video, music, and jump to actions among your pages. Plus, GoTalk NOW LITE is a full-feature scanning app! Features: • Choose 1, 2, 4, 9, 16, 25 or 36 locations per page. • Use images from your iPad camera, photo library, or the GoTalk Image Library. • Search the Internet in-app for the perfect image or icon. • Purchase SymbolStix, PCS, or Widgit Symbols libraries in-app. • Crop, scale, or rotate an image using your fingers. • Combine multiple images in a single communication location. • Color pages, borders, and text with any hue. • Move and size text with your fingers so it feels just right. • Record your voice or use our free text-to-speech voice. • Add spoken labels (auditory cues) to any button. Great for scanning, guiding visually impaired users, and identifying any new or difficult vocabulary. • Trim videos in-app, and play them from any communication location. • Select our alternate video interface to pause or exit the video easily. • Link songs from your playlist to any communication location and control them with Pause/Play, Next, and Previous. • Include a core vocabulary button for extra quick access to important messages. • Create multimedia social stories and step-by-step instruction layouts by linking pages with an after action. •In-app purchase allows for back up of communication books via Dropbox or to any Mac or PC for safekeeping. • Ability to create multiple books with unlimited pages via in-app purchase. • Store and share interactive templates (each including speech, video, text, and jump to links) on our online gallery via in-app purchase. • Download and edit premade templates from Attainment’s collection on the public gallery available via in-app purchase. • Print and save communication book layouts via PDFs. • Access LITE with single or two-switch scanning. Attainment is well known for top-notch customer service. Email us with questions or comments and check our website for free webinars. And yes, we're happy to talk to you on the telephone!
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: GoTalk® NOW LITE at Free against Scene Speak's $9.99. GoTalk® NOW LITE also leads on rating (4.2 vs 3.3) and update cadence (every 5 weeks vs every 4 months). Scene Speak's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 10) and review sentiment (76% vs 53%). On ratings volume, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
GoTalk® NOW LITE is free to download; Scene Speak costs $9.99 up front. GoTalk® NOW LITE sells 10 one-off in-app purchases. Scene Speak asks for nothing beyond the download.
GoTalk® NOW LITE holds the better App Store score, 4.2 against 3.3. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 9 and 17 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 76% of Scene Speak's written reviews are positive against 53% of GoTalk® NOW LITE's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Scene Speak ships an update every 4 months, GoTalk® NOW LITE every 5 weeks. Both last shipped on November 1, 2026.
| Parameter | Scene Speak | GoTalk® NOW LITE |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $9.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 3.3 (9 ratings) | 4.2 (17 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 76.2% of reviews — better | 52.6% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 9 | 17 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Every 5 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Paid | Free with in-app purchases — better |
| Devices | iPad | iPad |
| Requires iOS | 8.2 — better | 15.6 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 48 MB | 235 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Good Karma Applications, Inc | Attainment Company |
Customer experience
Scene Speak
GoTalk® NOW LITE
In-app purchases
Scene Speak
No in-app purchases
GoTalk® NOW LITE
- Kenny$0.99
- Nelly$0.99
- Ryan$0.99
Show 7 moreShow fewer
- Tracy$0.99
- Will$0.99
- Ella$11.99
- Josh$11.99
- Ready-Set-Communicate$19.99
- English (US) Keywords$59.99
- Upgrade to GoTalk NOW Features$119.99
Questions
Is Scene Speak free?
Is GoTalk® NOW LITE free?
Which has better reviews, Scene Speak or GoTalk® NOW LITE?
Do Scene Speak or GoTalk® NOW LITE have ads?
Which is updated more often, Scene Speak or GoTalk® NOW LITE?
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