It is often called speechreading because people use other clues, such as facial expressions, gestures and surroundings, to help them understand what is being said. Lipreading can help people who are hearing impaired to cope better with their hearing loss.

What is lip reading used for?

Lip reading

This is a technique to understand speech by visually interpreting the movements of the lips and tongue, using facial expression and body language to help.

Who uses lip reading?

Although lip reading is used most extensively by deaf and hard-of-hearing people, most people with normal hearing process some speech information from sight of the moving mouth.