Yes, Microsoft TTS SDK does support Arabic text-to-speech, especially through the Azure Cognitive Services Speech API. The newer neural TTS voices for Arabic (Modern Standard Arabic and a few regional variations) are much better than the older SAPI-based voices.

That said, one thing to watch out for is that Microsoft’s Arabic voices often pronounce full case endings (i‘rāb) even in simple phrases like “مساء الخير,” which can sound overly formal for many applications — especially in language learning or user-facing interfaces.

If you’re looking for a more natural and modern Arabic TTS solution, I recommend checking out Soutrise. It’s a web-based tool that uses newer AI voice models for Arabic (MSA and more) and outputs realistic speech without the stiffness you sometimes get from cloud TTS services. You can generate MP3 files directly and use them in your VB app or any other tool.

It’s especially useful if you just want fast, high-quality Arabic speech without diving deep into APIs.