ElevenLabs
The most natural-sounding AI voice we have heard, whether you are voicing a video or putting it on a live phone line.
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Scored on the same voice-agent rubric as the full platforms, so a building block like this scores low on the axes it does not address. Read its value score against its job.
See how it stacks up · Full rankings →The pick when the voice itself is the point. Over 10,000 voices, the best cloning around, and on a blind listen most people cannot tell it from a human. Not the cheapest, and aimed more at narration and video than busy phone lines, but the quality leader by a clear margin.
About $0.08 to 0.25 for a minute of conversation, once the phone line and the AI are added in.
That's roughly $4.80–15.00 an hour. Plans: from $0/mo (Free) up to $990/mo (Business).
Pricing
Show the cost breakdown
| What the platform charges to run the agent, before the phone line and the AI usage are added on. | $0.08 /min |
|---|---|
| The step that turns what the caller says out loud into text the AI can read. | — |
| The AI 'brain' that reads what the caller said and works out what to say back. | — |
| The step that turns the AI's written reply back into a spoken voice. | — |
| The phone line itself: the service that connects the call to a real phone number. Usually billed on top of the platform. | $0.02 /min |
| The total you actually pay for one minute of conversation once every piece is added up: the platform, the AI, the voice and the phone line. | $0.08–0.25 /min |
Priced by use. Voice AGENTS (conversational AI) have a $0.08/min base call rate (same on every plan tier; the /pricing/agents page) for the premium voice; add your LLM (pass-through, varies by model) and telephony at cost (about $0.02/min on Twilio) for a typical $0.08 to 0.25 all-in. NARRATION/video is per character on subscription tiers: Free (10k credits/mo), new Starter $6/mo (30k), Creator $22/mo (121k; the earlier stored $11 was a first-month 50% promo, still shown on the card), Pro $99/mo (600k), Scale $299/mo (1.8M), Business $990/mo (6M). Roughly $0.09 to 0.20 per 1,000 characters by tier and model (1 char = 1 credit on the standard models; Flash costs less), about $0.10 on the multilingual model. HIPAA, SOC 2 and GDPR are Enterprise-plan features.
Every plan in one place: the monthly fee, what each one includes, and the features it unlocks. Anything beyond a plan's allowance, or on a pay-as-you-go tier, is billed at the per-minute rate above. A blank in the features means the vendor's plan page does not state it for that plan, not that it is unavailable.
| Free | Starter | Creator | Pro | Scale | Business | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | $6/mo | $22/mo | $99/mo | $299/mo | $990/mo |
| Included | 10,000 credits ≈ 11 min of audio | 30,000 credits ≈ 33 min of audio | 121,000 credits ≈ 2.2 hrs of audio | 600,000 credits ≈ 11 hrs of audio | 1,800,000 credits ≈ 33 hrs of audio | 6,000,000 credits ≈ 111 hrs of audio |
| What each plan unlocks | ||||||
| Commercial licence | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Voice cloning | No | Instant | Instant + Professional | Instant + Professional | 3 Professional clones | 10 Professional clones |
| API access | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Team seats | — | — | — | — | 3 | 10 |
| Audio quality | 128 kbps MP3 | 128 kbps MP3 | 128 kbps MP3 | 192 kbps MP3 + PCM | 192 kbps MP3 + PCM | 192 kbps MP3 + PCM |
- Free Free10,000 credits · ≈ 11 min of audio
- Commercial licence
- No
- Voice cloning
- No
- API access
- Yes
- Team seats
- —
- Audio quality
- 128 kbps MP3
- Starter $6/mo30,000 credits · ≈ 33 min of audio
- Commercial licence
- Yes
- Voice cloning
- Instant
- API access
- Yes
- Team seats
- —
- Audio quality
- 128 kbps MP3
- Creator $22/mo121,000 credits · ≈ 2.2 hrs of audio
- Commercial licence
- Yes
- Voice cloning
- Instant + Professional
- API access
- Yes
- Team seats
- —
- Audio quality
- 128 kbps MP3
- Pro $99/mo600,000 credits · ≈ 11 hrs of audio
- Commercial licence
- Yes
- Voice cloning
- Instant + Professional
- API access
- Yes
- Team seats
- —
- Audio quality
- 192 kbps MP3 + PCM
- Scale $299/mo1,800,000 credits · ≈ 33 hrs of audio
- Commercial licence
- Yes
- Voice cloning
- 3 Professional clones
- API access
- Yes
- Team seats
- 3
- Audio quality
- 192 kbps MP3 + PCM
- Business $990/mo6,000,000 credits · ≈ 111 hrs of audio
- Commercial licence
- Yes
- Voice cloning
- 10 Professional clones
- API access
- Yes
- Team seats
- 10
- Audio quality
- 192 kbps MP3 + PCM
Credits are a prepaid balance you spend as you generate, like topping up a card. Here about one credit buys one character of speech and roughly 1,000 characters is a minute, so the bracketed figure is the speaking time each plan covers.
Prices in USD as set by the vendor · last checked 2026-07-11 · vendor pricing →
Slide your expected monthly volume to see roughly what ElevenLabs would cost.
A rough estimate from ElevenLabs's sourced rates, not a quote. Always confirm on the vendor's own pricing page before you commit.
At a glance
- Speech-to-text
- ElevenLabs Scribe
- Text-to-speech
- ElevenLabs · Bring your own voice: you can upload or clone a custom voice instead of being limited to the platform's stock ones.
- Languages
- en, es, fr, de, pt, hi
- Integrations
- Twilio, SIP trunk providers, MCP (Model Context Protocol), Native SDKs (web/mobile)
Compliance
Our full take
ElevenLabs is the one you pick when the voice itself is the product. The library runs past 10,000 voices in 70-plus languages, the cloning is the best in the business (instant for speed, professional for a long-term brand voice), and on a blind listen it is the one most people cannot tell from a human. That is the pitch, and it largely holds.
Pricing splits by what you are doing. For a voice agent you pay by the minute: $0.08 for the premium voice (the same base rate on every plan tier), plus your own AI model and the phone line at cost (about $0.02 on Twilio), so a realistic all-in lands $0.08 to 0.25. For narration and video you pay by the character on a subscription: a new Starter tier is $6 a month for 30,000 credits, Creator is $22 a month for 121,000 (a first-month promo halves it), Pro $99 for 600,000, and up from there, which works out around $0.09 to 0.20 per 1,000 characters depending on tier and model. One character is one credit on the standard models; the faster Flash model costs less.
The model line-up matters here. Flash v2.5 is built for real-time agents at about 75ms; Multilingual v2 and the newer v3 trade a little speed for richer, more emotional delivery. Scripting a YouTube voiceover, you want v3 or Multilingual. Running a live phone agent, you want Flash.
The customer stories back the pitch on both fronts. ElevenLabs’ own case-study hub features Storytel rethinking audiobook narration with its Voice Switcher and Headspace scaling its meditation content, with agent-side deployments at Alpha Bank, CoopVoce and Urban Company alongside. Those are the vendor’s own accounts rather than anything we have audited, but the calibre of the names is real.
On compliance, HIPAA, SOC 2 and GDPR sit on the Enterprise plan, with EU data residency and a zero-retention mode. If you are in healthcare or the EU and need those guarantees, budget for Enterprise rather than the self-serve tiers.
We have not scored ElevenLabs’ voices in our own listening tests yet, so the quality and range numbers on this page are an editorial preview, not a measured result. The pricing and capability detail is from ElevenLabs’ pricing page and docs, captured 2026-05-30.
ElevenLabs compared
Our in-depth pieces that put ElevenLabs side by side with the field, with the sourced numbers and a clear pick.
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- Best of Best voice AI platforms for HIPAA and healthcare
- Best of Best voice AI platforms for inbound customer support
- Best of Best AI voices for narration, ranked and priced
- Best of Best multilingual outbound voice platforms
- Head to head Cartesia vs ElevenLabs: speed or the voice library?
- Alternatives ElevenLabs alternatives: 4 voice platforms worth switching to
- Head to head ElevenLabs vs Retell: voice quality or a turnkey phone agent?
- Head to head ElevenLabs vs Vapi: voice quality or call control?
- Head to head Murf vs ElevenLabs: the studio or the voice engine?
- Head to head Speechify vs ElevenLabs: value or voice quality?
Alternatives to ElevenLabs
Other platforms that overlap with ElevenLabs on the same kind of work, ranked by how many capabilities they share, then by cheaper all-in cost per minute. Compare any of them side by side on the compare page.
Further reading
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Sources
- ElevenLabs customer-stories hub: named case studies incl. Storytel (audiobook narration with Voice Switcher) and Headspace (scaling meditation content), plus agent-side deployments (Alpha Bank, CoopVoce, Urban Company). · captured 2026-07-11
- Re-captured 2026-07-11 (screenshot in evidence/): Creator's regular price is $22/mo with a 'First month 50% off' promo showing $11 (the earlier stored $11 recorded the promo as the base); Free/Starter/Pro/Scale/Business unchanged; agents rate $0.08/min unchanged. · captured 2026-07-11
- ElevenLabs models docs (captured 2026-06-18): current TTS line-up is v3, Multilingual v2 (29 languages) and Flash v2.5 (32 languages, ~75ms). Turbo is retired, replaced by Flash; v3 covers 70+ languages but is not for real-time. · captured 2026-06-18
- ElevenLabs pricing page re-captured 2026-06-15: new Starter tier $6/mo (30k credits) added between Free and Creator; Free/Creator/Pro/Scale/Business unchanged; Business notes low-latency TTS as low as 5c/min. · captured 2026-06-15
- ElevenLabs Agents pricing page: $0.08/min base call rate (same on every plan tier), LLM billed separately (pass-through, varies by model). · captured 2026-06-02
- ElevenLabs pricing page re-captured 2026-06-02 for the quarterly re-verification; pricing reviewed against the live page (screenshot in evidence/). · captured 2026-06-02
- ElevenLabs plan page: per-plan feature matrix (commercial licence, cloning, API, seats, audio quality) · captured 2026-05-31
- ElevenLabs pricing page: subscription tiers, credits, per-character model · captured 2026-05-30
- ElevenLabs docs: voice library (10,000+) and capabilities · captured 2026-05-30
- ElevenLabs voice-cloning page: instant and professional cloning · captured 2026-05-30
- ElevenLabs voice generator: 10,000+ voices in 70+ languages · captured 2026-05-30