Narration and voiceovers
Create ads, podcasts, social videos, e-learning, games, and long-form spoken content in many languages.
Independent tool overview
ElevenLabs at a glance
ElevenLabs is an AI audio platform for speech generation, transcription, voice creation, dubbing, music, sound effects, real-time voice agents, and developer APIs.
Visit the official ElevenLabs site ↗
- Product type
- AI voice, audio, media, and agent platform
- Main creator suite
- ElevenCreative
- Voice agent suite
- ElevenAgents
- Developer access
- REST API, Python SDK, and TypeScript SDK
- Voice library
- 10,000+ voices
- Expressive TTS coverage
- 74 languages on Eleven v3
- Dubbing coverage
- 90+ languages
- Lowest commercial plan
- Starter at $6/month
- Professional cloning
- Creator plan or above; voice verification required
- Last reviewed
- August 29, 2026
Overview
What ElevenLabs is
ElevenLabs began with realistic text-to-speech and has expanded into a broad audio and conversational-AI platform. ElevenCreative serves creators in the browser, ElevenAgents builds and operates voice agents, ElevenAPI exposes the platform to developers, and enterprise customers can discuss private cloud deployments.
Its core speech products cover multilingual text-to-speech, speech-to-text, voice changing, voice isolation, voice design, Instant Voice Cloning, and Professional Voice Cloning. The platform also offers automatic dubbing, long-form Studio projects, productions, sound effects, music, images and video, and a ready-made phone receptionist product.
Model choice matters. Eleven v3 prioritizes expression and broad language coverage, while Flash models target real-time response latency. Voice selection, source-recording quality, language and accent match, model, and settings can all change naturalness and consistency more than a polished demo implies.
Plans share a monthly credit pool across products, but different models and operations consume credits differently. Text-to-speech often charges by input characters, while transcription, agents, dubbing, music, and other media use their own seconds-, minutes-, or generation-based rates.
Voice cloning and conversational agents create legal, privacy, and impersonation risks. Users should clone only voices they own or are authorized to use, document consent and commercial rights, disclose synthetic media where appropriate, minimize retained call and generation data, and keep human review over public or consequential output.
Use cases
Who ElevenLabs is best for
The strongest fit depends on the job you need the product to complete, not the size of its feature list.
Authorized voice cloning
Build a quick reference-based clone or a higher-consistency professional clone of the verified speaker's own voice.
Video and podcast localization
Translate multiple speakers while preserving timing, delivery, voice identity, and original background audio.
Real-time voice agents
Design phone or in-app conversational agents with telephony, knowledge, tools, monitoring, and programmatic control.
Audio-enabled applications
Integrate speech, transcription, alignment, voice transformation, music, sound effects, and agents through APIs.
Enterprise-controlled speech systems
Discuss VPC deployment, zero-retention API traffic, custom terms, higher concurrency, SSO, BAAs, and dedicated support.
Capabilities
Core ElevenLabs features
Text to Speech
Generates multilingual speech with a choice of quality-, expression-, and latency-oriented models.
Speech to Text
Transcribes recorded or streaming speech for captions, analysis, applications, and voice-agent workflows.
Voice library and design
Offers more than 10,000 shared voices and creates new synthetic voices from descriptive prompts.
Instant Voice Cloning
Conditions generation on short voice samples for a fast clone without a separate fine-tuning job.
Professional Voice Cloning
Fine-tunes a higher-consistency clone from extended clean recordings after voice-owner verification.
Voice Changer and Isolator
Transforms a recorded performance into another voice or separates speech from background sound.
Automatic Dubbing
Translates multi-speaker audio or video across more than 90 languages while retaining voices and background audio.
Studio and Productions
Supports long-form editing projects and, at the enterprise level, fully managed human-assisted production workflows.
Music and sound effects
Generates editable songs, instrumentals, vocals, and prompted sound effects under product-specific usage terms.
ElevenAgents
Builds low-latency conversational voice agents with a visual editor, tools, knowledge, telephony, and developer controls.
Developer APIs
Exposes the major speech, audio, media, and agent capabilities through REST plus official Python and TypeScript SDKs.
Private deployment
Lets approved enterprise customers run agents, TTS, or Scribe speech recognition inside AWS or Google Cloud infrastructure they control.
Process
How the ElevenLabs workflow works
Step 1
Define the output and rights
Choose narration, localization, transcription, music, or an agent, and document ownership, consent, territory, and commercial-use requirements first.
Step 2
Select the product and plan
Match the needed commercial license, cloning method, seats, audio quality, concurrency, credits, and retention controls to the plan.
Step 3
Choose a model and voice
Balance expression, language coverage, latency, price, output format, and accent fidelity for the actual audience and delivery channel.
Step 4
Prepare clean source material
Use a well-edited script and clean single-speaker recordings with consistent equipment and style when creating an authorized voice clone.
Step 5
Generate a short test
Test names, numbers, abbreviations, emotion, pacing, pronunciation, background audio, and difficult language transitions before using many credits.
Step 6
Direct and edit the result
Adjust the script, pronunciation, voice, model, speed, style, timing, or individual sections rather than repeatedly regenerating the same input blindly.
Step 7
Review with native speakers and owners
Have the voice owner, language reviewer, brand lead, and subject expert approve identity, translation, claims, tone, and disclosure.
Step 8
Export or integrate securely
Use the required audio format or API, protect keys, authenticate agent tools, rate-limit requests, and separate test from production data.
Step 9
Control retention and spend
Set deletion and recording policies, enable eligible zero-retention modes, monitor shared credits, and remove unused voices, data, and API keys.
Cost
ElevenLabs pricing and free plan
ElevenLabs uses monthly credits shared across its products. Exact output varies by model and operation, so credits are more reliable than a single minutes estimate. Annual plans cost the equivalent of ten monthly payments, and taxes are extra.
Free
$0/month
For testing the platform without commercial rights.
- 10,000 credits per month
- Text to Speech, Speech to Text, sound effects, Voice Design, music, and media tools
- 3 Studio projects
- Free-tier dubs are watermarked
- No paid-plan commercial license
Starter
$6/month
The entry paid plan for commercial creator use and fast voice cloning.
- 30,000 credits per month
- Commercial license
- Instant Voice Cloning
- 20 Studio projects
- Dubbing Studio access
- Annual equivalent: $5 per month
Creator
$22/month
For frequent individual production and Professional Voice Cloning.
- 121,000 credits per month
- First month advertised at $11
- Professional Voice Cloning
- Additional credit purchasing
- Annual equivalent: about $18.33 per month
Pro
$99/month
For high-volume individual or API use needing higher audio quality.
- 600,000 credits per month
- 44.1 kHz PCM through the API
- Up to 192 kbps audio
- Everything in Creator
- Annual equivalent: $82.50 per month
Scale
$299/month
For small production teams sharing a workspace.
- 1.8 million credits per month
- 3 workspace seats
- Team collaboration
- 3 Professional Voice Clones
- Annual equivalent: about $249.17 per month
Business
$990/month
For larger teams and lower unit costs at high speech volume.
- 6 million credits per month
- 10 workspace seats
- 10 Professional Voice Clones
- Low-latency TTS advertised from $0.05 per minute
- Annual equivalent: $825 per month
Enterprise
Custom
For custom deployment, compliance, concurrency, support, and volume terms.
- Custom credits and seats
- DPA and SLA options
- BAAs for eligible HIPAA customers
- Custom SSO and elevated concurrency
- Zero-retention and private-deployment options for eligible use cases
- Managed dubbing and volume discounts
Pricing checked . Check current pricing at the source ↗
Assessment
ElevenLabs strengths and limitations
Where it stands out
- Large, mature voice library plus prompt-designed and cloned voice options
- Strong combination of expressive quality, multilingual support, and real-time models
- Creator interface, agents platform, APIs, and private deployment cover very different buyers
- Dubbing retains multiple speakers and background audio across more than 90 languages
- Professional Voice Cloning includes an active voice-verification step
- Music, sound effects, transcription, isolation, and voice changing reduce the need for separate audio tools
- Official Python and TypeScript SDKs support production integration
- Enterprise controls include custom retention, private cloud, higher concurrency, and regulated-workload options
What to consider
- Shared credits are consumed at different rates across models and products, making output harder to predict from the headline allowance
- Free output lacks the paid commercial license and free-tier dubs are watermarked
- Professional Voice Cloning requires Creator or above, substantial clean audio, processing time, and voice-owner verification
- Voice verification reduces abuse but does not replace documented consent, publicity rights, contracts, or local law
- Pronunciation, accent, emotional consistency, and cross-language identity still require human direction and review
- Dubbing v2 is automatic, while the editable legacy Dubbing Studio uses v1 and is in maintenance mode
- Zero Retention Mode is limited to eligible enterprise API traffic; browser UI traffic is not covered
- Music, voice-library, cloned-voice, and other generated assets can have different commercial and distribution terms
Compare
ElevenLabs alternatives
The right alternative depends on the specific output, workflow, controls and budget your project requires.
Content Creator
Descript
Better for creators who prioritize transcript-based podcast and video editing around voice generation.
Explore Descript →Business Operations
Speechify
A simpler choice for turning documents and web content into listenable narration across consumer and creator workflows.
Explore Speechify →Content Creator
VibeVoice
An open-source local speech model for teams that prefer self-hosting and long multi-speaker generation over a broad managed platform.
Explore VibeVoice →Questions
ElevenLabs FAQs
What is ElevenLabs?
ElevenLabs is an AI audio platform for speech generation, transcription, voice design and cloning, dubbing, music, sound effects, conversational voice agents, and developer APIs.
Is ElevenLabs free?
Yes. The free plan includes 10,000 monthly credits and several creation tools, but it does not include the paid commercial license and free dubbing output is watermarked.
How much does ElevenLabs cost?
Monthly plans are Free, Starter at $6, Creator at $22, Pro at $99, Scale at $299, Business at $990, and custom Enterprise. Annual billing is priced as ten monthly payments.
What are ElevenLabs credits?
Credits are a shared monthly consumption unit across products. Text-to-speech commonly uses credits per input character, while transcription, dubbing, agents, music, and media operations use different rates.
Can I clone someone else's voice?
You must own or have authorization to use any supplied voice. Professional Voice Cloning currently requires the owner to pass voice verification, and users remain responsible for consent, rights, disclosure, and legal compliance.
What is the difference between Instant and Professional Voice Cloning?
Instant cloning conditions on short reference audio and is available quickly. Professional cloning fine-tunes from longer clean recordings for higher consistency, requires Creator or above, and verifies the voice owner.
Does ElevenLabs offer zero data retention?
Selected Enterprise customers can use Zero Retention Mode for eligible API requests and per-agent API traffic. It does not cover web UI or playground traffic, and exclusions apply.
Can ElevenLabs run in a private cloud?
Yes, for approved enterprise deployments. ElevenAgents, Text to Speech, and Scribe can run in customer-controlled AWS or Google Cloud infrastructure; access and documentation require a sales process.
Bottom line
Our ElevenLabs verdict
ElevenLabs is one of the strongest all-around choices when a project needs high-quality speech plus a path from creator workflow to API, agent, or private deployment. Starter is the real commercial entry point, while Creator unlocks professional cloning. The main buying work is not choosing a demo voice—it is modeling credits, securing voice rights, selecting the correct retention path, and testing the exact languages and delivery conditions in production.
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