Symbol and text communicators, a board editor and our own symbol library, for speech and language therapists and the teams who set up communication across home, school and care.
Install on devices you already have. No procurement, licence keys or waiting list.
Nothing to register and nothing sent to us, which keeps information governance simple.
Boards move between services, settings and other AAC apps.
Touch, one or two switches, joystick, games controller and face control.
Apps, board editor and symbols designed and built by one team.
Six tools, each built for a specific clinical job. They share symbols, voices and the Open Board Format, so a system set up in one works with the others.
A symbol communicator with text-to-speech or recorded voice. Start from established vocabularies such as Project Core and CommuniKate, or from boards you build yourself.
Type, or pick a stored phrase, and TexCom speaks it. Abbreviation expansion, quick Yes, No and SOS responses, and a large-text display for face-to-face conversation.
Build, colour-code and print communication boards in the browser, from our symbols, photos or AI-generated images, then export them to PiCom or other AAC apps.
Our own symbol library in nine styles. Adjust skin tone, hair, clothing and traditional dress, or switch to high contrast. Download SVGs or use the free API.
Opens real websites with a symbol above every word, reads pages aloud with highlighting, and prints or saves pages with symbols.
Adds symbols above text selected in any Windows application, reads it aloud and prints it with symbols.
Choose the description closest to the person you are working with. This is a starting point for your assessment, not a recommendation in place of it.
Start a trial in PiCom from a Project Core or CommuniKate template, adapt it, and add topic boards built in Sensory Boards. Print matching boards as a low-tech backup.
TexCom speaks typed messages and stored phrases, with abbreviation expansion and quick responses to reduce effort and fatigue. Phrase lists can be prepared for the person and imported.
PiCom supports one- and two-switch scanning, joystick, games controller, D-pad and face control on supported devices, and grid size can be matched to the person’s access.
SymBrowser adds symbols to real websites on iPad, iPhone and Mac. Symboliser adds them to any text on a Windows PC, which also suits preparing accessible information.
Adjust skin tone, hair, clothing and traditional dress, choose from nine styles, or use high contrast for cortical visual impairment. Download SVGs for your own resources.
Representation matters in AAC. Every Sensory Symbol comes in nine styles, and skin tone, hair colour, clothing and 60 traditional dress styles can all be adjusted. A high-contrast mode supports people with cortical visual impairment (CVI).
We draw the symbols ourselves. The library is searchable in 78 languages, downloadable as SVG for your own resources, and available through a free public API.
Our tools do not prescribe an approach. They are designed to support the practices many AAC teams already use, and to adapt as a person's needs change.
Start rich rather than restricted. Templates and phrase sets give access to a wide vocabulary from the first session.
Communication partners can model on the same board, and the message bar shows the whole utterance as it builds.
You set the grid and button positions, so familiar locations can stay put as vocabulary grows.
Begin with core-word templates, then add topic and personal words on linked boards.
High-tech and printed boards share the same symbols, alongside speech, gesture and signing.
Touch, switch scanning, joystick or face control, and change the method as needs change.
Clinical decisions stay with you and the person's team. We are software developers, not clinicians, and we build tools for the professionals who are.
How teams typically put our tools to work, across settings and without a long procurement process.
Install PiCom or TexCom on a device you already have, or run PiCom in a browser, and trial in the same session.
Choose a template or build boards, set the access method and voice, and personalise the symbols.
Send boards to home and school as .obz files, and print matching low-tech backups from Sensory Boards.
Edit boards as vocabulary and access needs change. Nothing is tied to one device or one service.
Our communicators hold no accounts and send nothing to us. That makes data protection impact assessments for NHS services, schools and care providers more straightforward.
| Platforms | iPad, iPhone, Mac, Android, Windows, Chromebook and web browsers |
|---|---|
| Board format | Open Board Format (.obf and .obz) import and export |
| Access methods | Touch, one or two switches, joystick, games controller, D-pad, cursor keys, face control |
| Voice output | The device’s own text-to-speech voices, or recorded audio on any button |
| Vocabularies | Project Core and CommuniKate templates, or build your own |
| Symbols | Sensory Symbols in nine styles, with skin tone, hair, clothing, 60 traditional dress styles and CVI high contrast; Global Symbols search in PiCom |
| Languages | Interface in many languages; symbol search in 78 languages |
| Data | No account; communication stays on the device; no adverts, analytics or tracking |
Global Symbols is a UK community interest company that makes symbol sets free to find and use. Our PiCom symbol sets are published there, with more to come, and PiCom can search Global Symbols from its button editor.
Sensory App House was founded by Professor Paul Blenkhorn and grew out of decades of assistive technology research and development. We are a small specialist team in Lancashire, and we design and build everything ourselves: the software, the symbols and the guides.
We work with speech and language therapists, AAC services and schools, and their feedback shapes what we build next.