Why does VoiceOver keep speaking after it names an item?

VoiceOver has a helpful hints feature that often speaks additional, hint, information after speaking the name of an item. The hint suggests actions you can take and can be extremely useful when you are learning VoiceOver. 

Examples of hints include:

When you tap an app, you hear its name followed by the hint "double tap to open".

When you tap in item in the status bar at the top of the screen you hear its name, followed by "status bar item" and then the long hint "swipe down with three fingers to reveal notifications; swipe up with three fingers to reveal the control centre; double tap to scroll to top".

Listening to these hints can initially be very helpful but they can also slow you down. You have several choices:

1. You don't need to listen to a hint in full; just go ahead with your next gesture while the hint is speaking.

2. If you prefer silence before you perform your next gesture, VoiceOver speech can always be paused with a two finger tap. Do be sure to tap just once with two fingers.

3. If you no longer need hints, they can be turned off at Settings / Accessibility / VoiceOver / verbosity / speak hints.

4. You may wish to alternate between having hints turned on and off. This may be particularly useful for demonstrations by trainers. There are two ways this can be done without delving deep in to settings. Hints may be added to your rotor so that you can turn hints on and off by turning the rotor to hints and then swiping up or down with one finger. Alternatively, hints may be added to the quick settings menu in Settings  / accessibility / VoiceOver / quick settings. Add hints, remove any unwanted items from the quick settings menu and you will then be able to summon the quick settings menu with a two finger quadruple tap and then swipe to hints and double tap to turn hints on or off.

So, don't let hints slow you down.  Remember also that they are only hints and not instructions. Having said that, it pays to listen to them in full occasionally; I had forgotten that touching a status bar item and then double tapping with one finger scrolls any page to the top. This can be much easier than repeated three finger vertical swipes or using the vertical scroll bar... and I had to be reminded of it by a hint!

If you aren't already in control of VoiceOver's hints, please consider spending a little time practicing the techniques above.

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