ElevenLabs
ElevenLabs is an AI voice and audio platform for creators, developers and enterprises. It converts text to speech in 70+ languages, clones or designs voices, transcribes audio with Scribe, generates music and sound effects, dubs video, and builds conversational voice agents. Work runs in a browser studio or through ElevenAPI, with a free plan that includes 10,000 credits every month.
What is ElevenLabs?
ElevenLabs is an AI voice and audio platform, built by the company of the same name, that turns text into speech, clones voices and runs conversational agents for creators, developers and enterprises. The problem it addresses is production audio: narration, dubbing, customer calls and music normally need studios, voice actors and weeks of editing, while generic text-to-speech output sounds flat and robotic. ElevenLabs builds its own foundational audio models and exposes them through two products and an API, so one subscription covers speech, transcription, music, sound effects, images and video.
ElevenCreative is the content platform. Text to Speech generates controllable, expressive speech across 70+ languages with emotion tags such as [whispers] or [sarcastically], and the voice library holds 10,000+ voices organised by use case: narration, advertisement, characters, conversational and social media. Voice Cloning creates instant or professional clones, Voice Design builds a new voice from a text prompt, Voice Changer and Voice Isolator clean up or rewrite existing recordings, and Music generates studio-quality tracks with vocals or instrumentals. An all-in-one Studio editor assembles podcasts, audiobooks and voiceovers, while Image and Video turn ideas into visuals with leading models such as Veo, Wan, Kling and Seedance. Dubbing translates a finished video while carrying the original performance across languages.
ElevenAgents covers real-time conversation. Agents listen, read and interact over phone, chat, email and WhatsApp in 70+ languages with ultra-low latency, and an analytics dashboard tracks resolution rate and CX metrics per agent version. Teams simulate real-world conversations to test agents before deployment, set guardrails that keep responses inside policy, and build workflows that apply business logic and connect to existing systems. Expressive Mode adds emotional delivery built for customer conversations.
ElevenAPI opens the same stack programmatically. Text to Speech models include Eleven Flash for 75 ms conversational latency, Eleven Multilingual v2 for lifelike consistent speech and Eleven v3 for maximum expressiveness; Scribe v2 targets 98% transcription accuracy with speaker diarization and character-level timestamps; the Music API was built in partnership with artists, labels and publishers and is cleared for broad commercial use. Officially maintained clients such as @elevenlabs/elevenlabs-js turn a conversion into a few lines of code.
Safety is part of the product rather than an afterthought: moderation of generated content, accountability when the technology is misused, and provenance so listeners can tell when audio is AI-generated. Pricing starts free with 10,000 credits a month, and credits are shared across every product.
ElevenLabs Core Features
Expressive text to speech
Generate controllable speech in 70+ languages with emotion tags, selectable models and adjustable delivery settings.
Voice cloning and voice design
Create instant or professional voice clones, or design a brand-new voice from a text prompt.
All-in-one Studio editor
Assemble podcasts, audiobooks and multi-speaker voiceovers on a timeline built on ElevenLabs audio research.
AI music and sound effects
Compose studio-quality tracks with vocals or instrumentals, and generate custom soundscapes and ambient audio.
Speech to text with Scribe
Transcribe audio with speaker diarization and character-level timestamps at a reported 98% accuracy.
Conversational voice agents
Deploy agents over phone, chat, email and WhatsApp with testing, guardrails, workflows and analytics.
Dubbing and voice isolation
Translate finished video while carrying the original performance, and separate voices from noisy recordings.
ElevenAPI developer access
Call every model from your own app with official client libraries, API keys and shared credit pricing.
Who is ElevenLabs for?
ElevenLabs is used wherever spoken audio has to be produced at scale, so the audience is broad but specific. The clearest groups are these. Content creators and podcasters. YouTubers, short-form editors, podcast producers and newsletter writers use Text to Speech and the voice library to add narration, ad reads and character voices without booking talent, and Studio to assemble multi-speaker episodes from a script. Audiobook and publishing teams. Independent authors, audio publishers and media companies use long-form narration, consistent character voices and Dubbing to release the same title in several languages, checking pronunciation in the editor before export. Game and animation studios. Indie game developers and animation teams want playful, characterful voices for cartoons, cutscenes and NPC dialogue, and use Voice Design or Voice Cloning to keep a character's voice stable across hundreds of lines. Marketing, advertising and localization teams. Agencies and in-house brand teams produce campaign voiceovers, social ads and multi-language versions of the same spot, leaning on commercial-license plans, Dubbing Studio and the Ads Engine. Developers and AI engineers. Anyone shipping audio features uses ElevenAPI, the client libraries and the API reference to add speech synthesis, real-time transcription, music or sound effects inside their own app, choosing models by latency, quality or expressiveness. Support, sales and product teams. Companies running inbound phone lines, chat and email build ElevenAgents that answer, route, refund and escalate calls, then watch resolution-rate analytics and guardrails before widening the rollout. Telecoms, banks, insurers, retailers, travel brands, healthcare providers and government services all appear in the customer stories. Startups and enterprises. Early-stage teams apply to the Startup Grants program for free credits to build and test, while large organizations buy Enterprise for custom terms, DPA and SLA assurance, HIPAA BAAs, custom SSO, more seats and elevated concurrency limits. ElevenLabs is a weaker fit for people who only need one-off watermark-free files with no account and no credit budget, or who need a fully offline speech model they can host themselves.
ElevenLabs Use Cases
Generate narration for a YouTube video or podcast episode without booking a voice actor.
Clone a founder's voice to record multilingual product walkthroughs and ad reads.
Produce an audiobook in several languages from a single manuscript and one consistent narrator.
Build a support agent that handles refund and order questions over the phone and escalates edge cases.
Add character voices, ambience and sound effects to an indie game or animated short.
Localize a marketing campaign into a dozen languages while keeping the original speaker's delivery.
Embed real-time speech synthesis or transcription inside a SaaS product through the API.
Compose cleared background music and voiceover for a social ad or client video.
ElevenLabs Pros and Cons
Pros
- Free plan includes 10,000 credits per month across every product, so text to speech, music and transcription can be tested before paying.
- One shared credit pool covers all products, with paid tiers from $6 Starter to $990 Business plus custom Enterprise and annual billing equal to ten months.
- ElevenAPI is documented end to end with client libraries and model tiers for latency, quality or expressiveness, including a 75 ms Flash model.
- The voice library lists 10,000+ voices, cloning works in instant and professional modes, and speech covers 70+ languages.
- Named enterprise customers and published case studies, among them Cisco, Deutsche Telekom, Klarna, Duolingo and Revolut, show production deployments at scale.
Cons
- Credits are charged per generation request rather than per usable download, so iterating on long scripts consumes the balance quickly.
- Commercial use, watermark-free downloads and higher 192 kbps audio quality require a paid plan; the Free tier is for evaluation only.
- Voice cloning and agent deployment come with moderation, consent and provenance rules that restrict impersonation and some character use cases.
FAQ About ElevenLabs
ElevenLabs Pricing
Free tier with 10,000 credits per month, then Starter $6, Creator $22, Pro $99, Scale $299 and Business $990 per month, Enterprise custom, and annual billing equal to ten months (two months free).
Check official pricingFree
10,000 credits per month and access to text to speech, speech to text, sound effects, voice design, music, image and three Studio projects.
Starter
30,000 credits per month plus commercial license, instant voice cloning, music commercial use, dubbing studio and 20 Studio projects.
Creator
121,000 credits per month, professional voice cloning and additional credits; $11 for the first month.
Pro
600,000 credits per month with 44.1 kHz PCM output via API and 192 kbps audio quality.
Scale
1.8M credits per month, three workspace seats, team collaboration and three professional voice clones.
Business
6M credits per month, ten seats, ten professional voice clones and low-latency TTS from about 5c per minute.
Enterprise
Custom credits and seats with DPA/SLA assurance, HIPAA BAAs, custom SSO, elevated concurrency, managed dubbing and priority support.
ElevenLabs Alternatives
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Vidnoz AI is a browser-based studio that turns text into talking-avatar videos. Pick an avatar and template, type a script, choose a voice from 2,000+, then export a lip-synced clip. It also bundles voice cloning, lip-synced translation in 135+ languages, Veo and Kling text-to-video models, an image generator, and a free plan with 30 daily credits.
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