---
title: preUtteranceDelay
framework: avfaudio
role: symbol
role_heading: Instance Property
path: avfaudio/avspeechutterance/preutterancedelay
---

# preUtteranceDelay

The amount of time the speech synthesizer pauses before speaking the utterance.

## Declaration

```swift
var preUtteranceDelay: TimeInterval { get set }
```

## Discussion

Discussion When multiple utterances exist in the queue, the speech synthesizer pauses a minimum amount of time equal to the sum of the current utterance’s postUtteranceDelay and the next utterance’s preUtteranceDelay.

## See Also

### Configuring utterance timing

- [rate](avfaudio/avspeechutterance/rate.md)
- [AVSpeechUtteranceMinimumSpeechRate](avfaudio/avspeechutteranceminimumspeechrate.md)
- [AVSpeechUtteranceMaximumSpeechRate](avfaudio/avspeechutterancemaximumspeechrate.md)
- [AVSpeechUtteranceDefaultSpeechRate](avfaudio/avspeechutterancedefaultspeechrate.md)
- [postUtteranceDelay](avfaudio/avspeechutterance/postutterancedelay.md)