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ElevenLabs is an AI-powered text-to-speech platform capable of producing voices that are indistinguishable from human speech. Founded in 2022 by Piotr Dąbkowski (formerly of Google) and Mateusz Staniszewski (formerly of Palantir), the company has quickly established itself as the global leader in this sector, whether for text-to-speech, voice cloning, or automated video dubbing.
What the platform offers goes far beyond simple “text that talks”. ElevenLabs understands the context of a sentence, knows when to pause, adjusts the intonation to convey the desired emotion, and reproduces the timbre of a real human voice with astonishing accuracy.
This guide is intended for content creators who want to take their YouTube or podcast channel to the next level, as well as freelancers, microbusinesses, and small and medium-sized businesses looking to automate their audio production, dub their videos in multiple languages, or incorporate a realistic voice into their digital products.
Here you’ll find everything you need to know before subscribing: features, pricing, real-world use cases, limitations, and of course how to get a discount on Freelance Stack.
Text-to-speech is nothing new. What is new, however, is the level of realism that ElevenLabs has achieved. While most competing tools still produce voices that sound “artificial”, ElevenLabs reproduces the breath, the micro-hesitations, and the warmth of a natural voice. The result: the listener stays focused on the content, not distracted by mechanical intonation.
Compared to its main competitors, ElevenLabs stands out for the raw quality of its voices. Descript (available on Freelance Stack) offers an approach more focused on comprehensive audio/video editing, making it a complementary tool rather than a direct competitor. Murf.ai charges based on the duration of the output rather than per character, which may suit certain users, but the difference in quality remains noticeable. Play.ht is primarily aimed at developers with a more accessible API, but it lacks the level of realism found in ElevenLabs.
Who uses ElevenLabs on a daily basis? YouTubers and podcasters who want to save time on production, marketing teams creating demos or explainer videos, developers integrating voice into their apps, and customer success teams automating their phone support.
ElevenLabs works on a credit system: each character converted to speech consumes credits. The Multilingual v2 model consumes 1 credit per character, while the Flash model (optimized for speed and low latency) consumes only 0.5 credits per character, effectively doubling your quota.
Unused credits can be carried over for up to two months on paid plans. Annual billing saves you about 17%, which is the equivalent of two months free.
| Plan | Monthly price | Credits/month | Commercial Rights | Voice Cloning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | 0 € | 10 000 | No (attribution required) | No |
| Starter | ~5 $/month | 30 000 | Yes | Instant (10 voices) |
| Creator | ~22 $/month | 100 000 | Yes | Instant + Professional |
| Pro | ~99 $/month | 500 000 | Yes | Professional |
| Scale | ~330 $/month | 2 000 000 | Yes | Professional + 3 seats |
| Business | ~1 320 $/month | 11 000 000 | Yes | 5 seats + ultra-low latency |
| Enterprise | Upon request | Custom | Yes | SSO, HIPAA, Dedicated SLA |
A discount on ElevenLabs is available through Freelance Stack, giving access to these plans at a preferential rate.
ElevenLabs runs entirely in the browser, with no installation required. The interface is clean and efficient, in the classic B2B SaaS style: a navigation menu on the left that groups all the features, and a central workspace.
After signing up, go to the Speech Synthesis tab. Paste your text into the field provided, select a voice from the library, and click “Generate”. The audio file is ready in a few seconds.
The voice library offers more than 1,000 options created by the community or by the ElevenLabs team itself: male and female voices, American, British, and French accents, and many others. You can preview each voice before using it.
There are a few settings available: speech rate, voice stability (the more stable it is, the “smoother” the result), and clarity/emphasis. With a little experimentation, you can quickly achieve professional-quality results.
For long-term projects (audiobook narration, e-learning courses), the Projects tab (available starting with the Creator plan) offers a structured work environment: you can divide the text into chapters, assign different voices to distinct characters, and manage the entire project as you would a real editorial project.
ElevenLabs is more than just a text-to-speech converter. Here’s what the platform can actually do.
ElevenLabs’ text-to-speech technology is the heart of the system. It is based on two main models. The Multilingual v2 model offers the highest quality: it supports 32 languages, including French with its subtle accent variations, and produces audio at 192 kbps on the Creator plan and higher. The Flash model prioritizes speed and low latency, making it ideal for real-time conversational agents where every millisecond counts.
This is probably the feature that made ElevenLabs famous. There are two levels of cloning:
Instant cloning (Instant Voice Cloning) is available starting with the Starter plan. You provide about 1 minute of clean audio with no background noise, and the AI generates a model of your voice. The quality is good enough for everyday use, such as YouTube videos or voice-overs.
Professional cloning (Professional Voice Cloning), available starting with the Creator plan, requires a minimum of 30 minutes of recording, ideally several hours. The realism obtained is then virtually indistinguishable from the original. This option is designed for audiobooks, radio commercials, or any content where broadcast quality is expected. One important constraint: ElevenLabs requires you to authenticate your voice by reading a text provided by the platform, to prevent fraudulent use.
The Dubbing Studio lets you upload a video (from your computer or by pasting a YouTube, TikTok, X, or Vimeo link) and have it automatically dubbed into another language, while preserving the original voice’s tone. Since 2024–2025, ElevenLabs has added lip-syncing and automatic language detection.
You choose the source language, the target language, the number of speakers, and the output resolution, and ElevenLabs takes care of the rest. For content creators who want to reach an international audience, this is a real game-changer.
ElevenLabs has recently begun offering the ability to build voice AI agents capable of interacting in real time with your customers or users via phone, chat, email, or WhatsApp. These agents listen, read, and respond with a latency of less than 400 ms on Business plans and higher. Some companies are beginning to deploy this technology to automate their first-level phone support.
Less well-known but very useful: ElevenLabs lets you generate sound effects from a text description (“footsteps in the snow”, “a Parisian café atmosphere”). You can also create musical compositions using Eleven Music, the music generator built into the platform.
ElevenLabs can meet a wide range of needs depending on your business. Here are a few typical scenarios to help you visualize how the tool can be used in your day-to-day work.
An independent consultant publishes online courses. Rather than recording each module in a quiet room with a decent microphone, he writes his scripts and generates his voice-overs using ElevenLabs. The production time for each module drops from 2 hours to 20 minutes. He uses the Creator plan at $22/month, which is more than offset by the productivity gain.
A French startup produced 15 explanatory videos in French. Using Dubbing Studio, it localized them into English, Spanish, and German in just a few hours. Without ElevenLabs, this process would have required hiring professional voice actors for each language, at a cost several times higher.
A small agency creates radio spots and podcast ads for its clients. With ElevenLabs Pro, it has a monthly quota of 500,000 characters—more than enough to produce several dozen spots per month without having to coordinate recording sessions with voice actors.
A mid-sized e-commerce company is rolling out an ElevenLabs-based conversational AI agent to handle first-level calls: order status, return policy, practical information. According to user feedback on the platform, the call completion rate is around 95%, freeing up human teams for complex cases.
A freelance developer is building a language-learning app. He integrates the ElevenLabs API to dynamically generate pronunciations of words and phrases on the fly. The quality of the voices significantly improves the user experience compared to traditional TTS alternatives.
Use Flash for your drafts and tests, then switch back to Multilingual v2 for the final output. This way, you effectively double your character quota without paying more.
Prioritize 1 to 2 minutes of crystal-clear audio over 10 minutes with background noise. Articulate clearly, vary your tone slightly, and be sure to speak in the same language as the one in which you plan to use the cloned voice.
Manually specify the number of speakers rather than letting the AI determine it automatically, especially if you’re aiming for a professional result. This significantly improves the accuracy of the result.
When your monthly credits run out, you’ll continue to generate audio and will be billed by the minute. Enable this option if your usage is irregular, but keep a close eye on your usage to avoid surprises at the end of the month.
If you use ElevenLabs little during a quiet period, you can draw on those carried-over credits for a month of intensive production, without upgrading to a higher plan.
to automate your workflows. For example, automatically trigger audio generation when a blog post is published, or convert your emails into audio files for an audio newsletter.
ElevenLabs offers a well-documented API that is compatible with all common development environments. The most commonly used integrations are:
🔗 Make (formerly Integromat) for automating workflows: for example, to generate an audio file as soon as content is published on your CMS. Make is available at Freelance Stack.
🔗 Make (formerly Integromat) for automating workflows: for example, to generate an audio file as soon as content is published on your CMS. Make is available on Freelance Stack.
🔗 Notion, WordPress, and HubSpot via Make or Zapier connectors: ideal for content teams that want to automate their voice-over production.
🔗 Native compatibility with major distribution platforms: YouTube, TikTok, Vimeo, Spotify (for podcasts). Files can be exported as MP3 or WAV, depending on the plan.
For its Business and Enterprise plans, ElevenLabs offers SOC 2 and GDPR compliance, along with a Full Privacy mode and end-to-end encryption, which provides peace of mind for companies that handle sensitive data.
ElevenLabs is not without its flaws, and it would be dishonest not to mention them.
The coexistence of different models (Flash, Multilingual v2, Conversational AI) with varying usage rates makes it difficult to accurately predict costs, especially for beginners. You may be surprised by how quickly you exceed your limits.
Upgrading from Pro ($99/month) to Scale ($330/month) is a significant decision, especially if the only reason is to add one or two additional seats.
ElevenLabs was trained primarily on English-speaking voices (American, British). French regional accents or minority languages may yield less convincing results.
These require the Business plan at $1,320 per month, which puts them out of reach for very small organizations.
Who shouldn’t choose ElevenLabs?
If you only need voice-overs very occasionally (a few minutes a month), the free plan may be sufficient, but the commercial restrictions will quickly become a hindrance. Descript is a good alternative if you’re primarily looking for a comprehensive audio/video editing tool with built-in voice features, without needing the maximum level of realism offered by ElevenLabs.
Before you get started, here are the most frequently asked questions on ElevenLabs.
Yes, the Multilingual v2 model handles French well, with a good command of accent nuances. In total, the platform supports nearly 32 languages.
Not with the free plan. Starting with the Starter plan ($5/month), a commercial license is included, and you can freely monetize the content you create.
For instant cloning, about 1 minute of clean recording is sufficient. For professional, broadcast-quality cloning, you’ll need at least 30 minutes of audio—ideally, several hours.
No, for paid plans, ElevenLabs allows you to carry over unused credits to the next two months.
For the Business and Enterprise plans, the platform offers SOC 2 and GDPR compliance, along with a Full Privacy mode and end-to-end encryption. For lower-tier plans, data is processed in accordance with the standard terms and conditions.
ElevenLabs includes safeguards to prevent unauthorized voice cloning, including voice authentication mechanisms for professional cloning. You must have the rights to the voice you wish to clone.
Flash is optimized for speed and low latency, making it perfect for real-time conversational agents. Multilingual v2 offers superior audio quality, making it ideal for final productions.
Yes, an API is available with its own pricing plans (separate from the UI plans). Developers can integrate ElevenLabs’ voice capabilities directly into their applications.
ElevenLabs has quickly established itself as the go-to tool for everything related to AI-powered voice generation. The quality of its voices far exceeds what competitors in the same segment offer, and the breadth of its features (TTS, cloning, dubbing, AI agents, sound effects, music) makes it a nearly comprehensive solution for content creators, agencies, and product teams.
For a freelancer or a startup, the Creator plan at $22/month is likely the most suitable entry point: it unlocks professional cloning, long projects, and enough monthly capacity for the vast majority of common uses. For an SME looking to integrate voice into its tools or automate its content production, the Pro or Scale plans offer the necessary capacity.
