How to use Anan

Anan is a web app — nothing to buy and no app store needed. Open it, and a friendly start menu lets everyone go straight to what they need.

1. Visit the app on a phone, tablet, computer or interactive whiteboard.
2. On the welcome screen, tap Continue (it reads “Continue as guest” until a carer signs in — the communicator never needs an account). Carers and clinicians can tap the Sign in pill to unlock their toolset.
3. On the start menu, choose Talk, Boards, Type, Learn, or “I need…” for quick & urgent words.
4. Tap Set up & accessibility to choose a theme, button size, voice and access method — or just start talking and adjust later.

Best used together at first — a partner modelling alongside the communicator. The person’s own voice is never gated behind a login; if nobody can tap, Anan opens the board by itself after a few seconds.

1. Tap picture tiles — each word is added to the message bar at the top.
2. Press the big green Speak button to say the whole message aloud in a natural voice.
3. Press Show to display the message full-screen in large text — for a noisy room or a partner who is hard of hearing. Tap anywhere to close.
4. Tap a word in the message bar to re-speak just that word; press and hold to remove it.
5. Delete removes the last word; Clear empties the bar — and an Undo appears straight away if you cleared by mistake.

Tiles never move — every word keeps its place, which builds fast, reliable muscle memory. New words are only ever added, never reshuffled.

Core words are always front and centre. Two boards sit right after Core to make conversation faster: Quick chat — whole social phrases that speak the moment you tap them (Hi, Thank you, My turn) — and Describing — the words that turn a request into a comment (it’s hot, that’s funny, too loud).

1. Use the tab strip under the message bar to switch boards.
2. Tap the pinned Boards button to open the all-boards overview — every board as a big card, one tap to jump there.
3. Search any word. Type into the search box to find a word across every board; tap a result and Anan jumps there and gently highlights the tile.
4. Add your own words and photos in Settings → Vocabulary editor.

1. Open Type from the start menu or the top bar.
2. Tap keys to write — word prediction suggests the next word, getting smarter the more it’s used.
3. The optional talking keyboard speaks each letter as you type and the whole word at each space — great for emerging spelling and reading.
4. Press Speak to say it, or Add to board to drop it into your message.

The Learn area has friendly activities for communication and early literacy — listening, first sounds, building words, reading and sentence-building. There are no wrong answers: every try is encouraged and the answer is always shown.

1. Open Learn and pick an activity.
2. Choose whether letters are voiced as sounds (for decoding) or names.
3. After spelling a word, tap Add to message to use it in real conversation.

1. Press and hold (or right-click) a word to open its grammar forms — the base word is always first.
2. Green action words give tense and person — eat → eats / eating / ate. Orange thing-words give plurals and belonging — dog → dogs / dog’s.
3. Blue describing words give comparison and emphasis — big → bigger / biggest / very big / too big.
4. Using a keyboard or switch? Press the down arrow on a focused tile, or open the menu while scanning.

Anan only offers forms it’s sure of — tricky words are left alone, so you never see a wrong ending.

Anan supports switch users end-to-end — including those with low vision or CVI.

1. In Settings → Access method, choose 1-switch (auto-scan) or 2-switch, and set the scan speed.
2. Turn on Speak the scan so each group and word is read aloud as the highlight lands — scan by ear, no need to watch the screen.
3. Everything is reachable by switch: the board, message bar, boards overview, grammar menus and the Undo prompt.

Try switch scanning in the live demo →

Set Anan up to suit the communicator’s eyes, hands and preferences — in Settings → Display and Voice & sound.

• 6 themes: Madagascar · Calm · Midnight (dark) · Ocean · Sunset · Mono
• Button size S–XL · High contrast · Reduced motion · Easy-read font
• Voice, speed & pitch · Clear-after-speaking (fast turn-taking)

The word colours (the category code) stay the same across every theme, so word-finding never changes.

1. Open Settings → Communicator profiles.
2. Add a profile for each person — each keeps their own words, settings, voice, history, learning progress and photo, all separate.
3. Tap a profile to switch. A communication lock can hide the caregiver tools so settings aren’t changed by accident, while the board and voice stay fully active.

Turn everyday use into evidence for plan reviews and AT assessments — all generated on the device.

1. Open Settings → Clinical report.
2. See most-used vocabulary, language composition, and a Literacy & learning progress summary.
3. Add notes, then Print / Save PDF or Export CSV. Nothing leaves the device to make the report.

1. Open the app in your browser.
2. Choose Add to Home Screen (or Install) — it then opens like any app, even offline.
3. On iPhone & iPad: open in Safari, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen.
4. Press and hold the app icon for quick shortcuts to “I need” urgent words or Type.

Full install guide, with iOS and Android steps →