Last verified October 10, 2026.
Details about ElevenLabs come from its public pages as they were on October 10, 2026. ElevenLabs may have changed them since, and a page that was unclear to us may be clear to you. Corrections: support@readaloudai.org. We make ReadAloud, so read this page with that in mind and check anything important with ElevenLabs directly.
About ElevenLabs
How ElevenLabs positions itself: A voice-AI platform whose text-to-speech API offers expressive, multi-language models, a large voice library and voice cloning, alongside speech-to-text, agents and audio tools.
Price per 1 million characters
USD per one million characters, by tier. Other units are shown as the vendor writes them, not converted.
| Option | Listed price | What it covers | Against ReadAloud Live |
|---|---|---|---|
| ReadAloud Live | $4 per 1M characters | the low-latency tier, built for live calls and voice agents | Reference point |
| ReadAloud Studio | $10 per 1M characters | the higher-priced tier for read-aloud and narration, with several English voices | $6 above ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Eleven v4 | $80 per 1M characters (source: elevenlabs.io) | Up to 10,000 characters per request; 90+ languages. | $76 higher than ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Eleven v4 Turbo | $40 per 1M characters (source: elevenlabs.io) | Vendor-stated median inference latency ~100ms. | $36 higher than ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Eleven v3 | $80 per 1M characters (source: elevenlabs.io) | 5,000 character limit per request; 70+ languages. | $76 higher than ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Eleven v3 Conversational | $40 per 1M characters (source: elevenlabs.io) | Low-latency v3 tuned for realtime conversation; vendor-stated ~280ms. | $36 higher than ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Eleven Multilingual v2 | $80 per 1M characters (source: elevenlabs.io) | 10,000 character limit per request; 29 languages. | $76 higher than ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Flash / Turbo (Flash v2.5) | $40 per 1M characters (source: elevenlabs.io) | 40,000 character limit per request; 32 languages; the models page describes it as 50% lower price per character for API generations. Shown at API list price; time-limited promotions are not included. | $36 higher than ReadAloud Live |
| ElevenLabs: Subscription plans (credits) | Vendor's own unit: USD per month; credits; not converted (source: elevenlabs.io) | Free $0 (10,000 credits), Starter $6 (30,000), Creator $22 (121,000), Pro $99 (600,000), Scale $299 (1,800,000), Business $990 (6,000,000), Enterprise custom. Credits are shared across all products. | Not comparable: ElevenLabs lists a different unit |
Every per-character list price we found for ElevenLabs, Eleven v4 at $80, Eleven v4 Turbo at $40, Eleven v3 at $80, Eleven v3 Conversational at $40, Eleven Multilingual v2 at $80 and Flash / Turbo (Flash v2.5) at $40, is higher than both ReadAloud Live ($4) and ReadAloud Studio ($10) per 1M characters.
ElevenLabs' own headline, as of October 10, 2026: $0.04 per 1K characters ($40 per 1M) for Flash / Turbo; flagship v4 and v3 models list at $0.08 per 1K ($80 per 1M).
Free tier at ElevenLabs: Free plan: $0 per month with 10,000 credits per month (about 10 minutes of audio per the pricing page). The Commercial License is listed as starting at the Starter plan. ReadAloud: A one-time grant of free credits worth $0.10 (about 10,000 characters of speech), shared by all keys on the account.
Tiers cover different things, so compare on your own monthly volume, and check ElevenLabs' pricing page before you decide. Current ReadAloud prices: /developers.
Side by side
"Not stated on the pages we reviewed" marks what ElevenLabs' pages did not say. We print no head-to-head latency number.
| Topic | ReadAloud | ElevenLabs |
|---|---|---|
| Voices | Live: one American English voice. Studio: several English voices. | 3,000+ community-shared voices in the Voice Library per docs; the Voice Changer entry on the pricing page cites 17,000+ voices (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| Languages | English today | 29 (Multilingual v2), 32 (Flash v2.5), 70+ (v3), 90+ (v4 and v4 Turbo), depending on model (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| Custom voices or cloning | API, with a consent step and a payment method | Instant Voice Cloning (short samples, available on most plans, Starter and up per pricing page) and Professional Voice Cloning (Creator plan or above; verification step confirms the voice is the account holder's own; docs say cloning someone else's voice is not allowed even with consent). Voice Design creates voices from text descriptions. The Commercial License is listed from the Starter plan upward. (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| Streaming | WebSocket and HTTP streaming | WebSocket: yes; HTTP streaming: yes (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| Time to first audio | ReadAloud Live: about 250 ms (our measurement, median to first audio byte, warm connection, San Jose; October 10, 2026; /developers#vs-elevenlabs) | Vendor-stated: 'Ultra-low latency (~75ms)' for Flash v2.5; footnote 'Excluding application & network latency' (https://elevenlabs.io/docs/overview/models). Not measured by us. (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| Output formats | mp3, opus, wav, pcm; 8 kHz mu-law and A-law over WebSocket | mp3 (22.05 to 44.1 kHz, 32 to 192 kbps), pcm (8 to 48 kHz), wav (8 to 48 kHz), opus (48 kHz, 32 to 192 kbps), ulaw_8000, alaw_8000 |
| SSML | No SSML and no audio tags. | Yes |
| OpenAI-compatible speech endpoint | Yes, /v1/audio/speech | No. Documented endpoint is POST /v1/text-to-speech/{voice_id} with an xi-api-key header and an output_format query such as mp3_44100_128; no OpenAI-style /v1/audio/speech mode was found in the pages read. |
| Limit per request | 5,000 characters | Model dependent: 5,000 (v3), 10,000 (v4, Multilingual v2), 40,000 (Flash v2.5) (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| Concurrency | Up to 12 Live streams per server; more start under load | Not stated on the pages we reviewed |
| SDKs and plugins | Python and JavaScript libraries (readaloud), Pipecat and LiveKit plugins, any OpenAI SDK | Python (pip install elevenlabs) and JavaScript / TypeScript |
| HIPAA | Not claimed | Mentioned on their pages; see the note below the table for what it covers (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| SOC 2 | Not claimed | Not stated on the pages we reviewed (source: elevenlabs.io) |
| GDPR | Not claimed | Not stated on the pages we reviewed (source: elevenlabs.io) |
About ElevenLabs' compliance wording: Self-attested: docs say ElevenAgents is HIPAA-eligible with BAAs available to eligible customers, and the pricing page lists Scribe v2 Medical as HIPAA-eligible. Whether this extends to the text-to-speech API was not stated on pages read. Zero Retention Mode for API use is described as an Enterprise option. A Trust Center exists (compliance.elevenlabs.io) but its content did not render for us, so SOC 2 and GDPR were not confirmed.
What ElevenLabs lists as strengths
- Expressive model line-up: v4 and v3 support audio tags and multi-speaker dialogue, covering 70+ to 90+ languages. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- Large voice catalogue: 3,000+ Voice Library voices plus instant and professional cloning and text-described Voice Design. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- WebSocket text-streaming endpoint with word-to-audio alignment for partial text input, plus a vendor-stated ~75ms Flash model for realtime use. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- Wide output format choice including mp3, pcm, wav, opus and 8 kHz mu-law and A-law for telephony. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- Pay-as-you-go and subscription options with a free plan for evaluation. (source: elevenlabs.io)
Conditions to check with ElevenLabs
Limits or conditions from the pages we reviewed.
- The Free plan does not list a Commercial License; it begins at Starter. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- Eleven v4 and v3 do not support SSML break tags; the docs point to other pacing techniques. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- The Voice Library is not available via the API to free-tier users. (source: elevenlabs.io)
ElevenLabs usage terms
From the vendor pages we reviewed; not legal advice.
- Commercial use: Pricing page lists the Commercial License as included from the Starter plan; the Free plan row does not list it. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- Attribution or conditions: Voice cloning is subject to ElevenLabs Terms of Service and Prohibited Use Policy; Professional Voice Clones require a verification process (voice-cloning help page). (source: elevenlabs.io)
Where ReadAloud is different
- Voices: ElevenLabs lists 3,000+ community-shared voices in the Voice Library per docs; the Voice Changer entry on the pricing page cites 17,000+ voices. ReadAloud: Live: one American English voice. Studio: several English voices. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- SSML: ElevenLabs lists SSML support; ReadAloud does not accept it, so markup in your text would have to be removed or rewritten.
- Custom voices, as ElevenLabs' pages describe them: Instant Voice Cloning (short samples, available on most plans, Starter and up per pricing page) and Professional Voice Cloning (Creator plan or above; verification step confirms the voice is the account holder's own; docs say cloning someone else's voice is not allowed even with consent). Voice Design creates voices from text descriptions. The Commercial License is listed from the Starter plan upward. (source: elevenlabs.io)
- Compliance: ElevenLabs' pages mention HIPAA; ReadAloud claims none. (source: elevenlabs.io)
Which one fits
ElevenLabs may suit you if this describes you: teams that want expressive, multi-language text to speech with a large voice library and voice cloning, and that pay per character or through ElevenLabs credit plans.
ReadAloud may suit you for streaming English speech at a low price per character.
What we could not confirm about ElevenLabs
- Per-plan concurrency limits (pricing page table has a Concurrent requests row, column mapping ambiguous in extracted text)
- SOC 2 and GDPR statements (Trust Center content did not render)
- Whether HIPAA eligibility covers the text-to-speech API specifically
- Whether an OpenAI-compatible speech route exists (none found in pages read)
- Price per 1M characters under subscription plans (depends on credits per character; list prices are what is recorded here)
- Time-limited promotions were shown on the pricing pages when we reviewed them; they are left out, so the prices on this page are list prices; check the pricing page for current offers.
Sources
- ElevenAPI pricing (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- ElevenLabs pricing (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- Models (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- Text to Speech capabilities (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- Create speech (API reference) (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- WebSocket (API reference) (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- Voices (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- TTS best practices (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- HIPAA (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- Streaming text to speech (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- ElevenAPI quickstart (retrieved October 10, 2026)
- Voice cloning (retrieved October 10, 2026)