Voiceover, text to speech and sound effects pricing

Where to make a voiceover or a sound effect, what each one costs in credits, the voices, the length limits, when you are charged, and how to get a voiceover from the MCP.

One credit is half a cent, so 5 credits is $0.025.

Prices at a glance

What	Credits	Limit per request
Voiceover (API and MCP, 9 voices)	5 per 1,000 characters, minimum 2	1,000 characters
Text to speech, standard voices	5 per 1,000 characters, minimum 2	4,096 characters
Text to speech, HD voices	8.4 per 1,000 characters rounded up (9 for 1,000), minimum 3	4,096 characters
Text to speech, premium named voices	100 per 1,000 characters, minimum 3	5,000 characters
Sound effects	1.25 per second rounded up, minimum 5	20 seconds
UGC Studio character voice ("Hear it" and the voice for a voiceover take)	Free	600 characters, 40 an hour

A 200 character line costs 2 credits on the voiceover and the standard voices (the minimum), 3 on HD, and 20 on a premium named voice.

Voiceover from the MCP or the API

The voiceover is a spoken MP3 from text: narration, an ad read, a podcast intro, a character line. It is saved to your gallery as audio.

Price: 5 credits per 1,000 characters, minimum 2. It is counted per byte of text: plain English is one byte per character, while accented and non-Latin text can cost up to 3 times as much.
Length: up to 1,000 characters a call, about a minute of speech. Split a longer script at sentence ends and make several calls.
Voices (9): Jessica, Laura, Katie, Sarah, Liam, Eric, Roger, Brian and Bill. Sarah is the default. These are the same stock voices as the UGC Studio voice picker.
When you pay: the credits are taken when the request is accepted and given back automatically if no audio is delivered.
Payment check: it runs the same payment check as other paid generations.

From the MCP (version 0.5.0 and later), ask your assistant for a voiceover. It uses two tools:

aetherwave_list_voices is free and lists the 9 voices, the price and the per-call limit.
aetherwave_generate_speech takes the text and an optional voice. It reads the exact price first, so an unknown voice or a text that is too long fails before anything is spent. Pass maxCredits to refuse any call that would cost more.

From the API: GET /api/v1/audio/voices lists the voices and price, POST /api/v1/audio/speech/estimate returns the exact charge for a text without spending anything, and POST /api/v1/audio/speech makes the voiceover.

Text to speech in the studios

Lip Sync Studio: step 2, Audio Input, the TTS tab. Type the line, pick a voice and a speed.
Project Studio: the AI assistant can add a voiceover with a Standard or HD voice.
UGC Studio, Brand Studio and Show Builder use the same text to speech when they need a spoken line.

Standard and HD use 6 voices: Nova, Onyx, Fable, Echo, Shimmer and Alloy. A few studios also offer premium named voices (for example Katie and Amy); those are priced at the premium rate above.

When you pay: studio text to speech is charged after the audio is ready. If it fails, nothing is charged.

Sound effects

Make a sound effect from a text description in Music Editing (the Sound Effects tool), in Lip Sync Studio, or from the Music DAW and Project Studio assistants.

Price: 1.25 credits per second, rounded up, minimum 5. That is 7 credits for 5 seconds, 13 for 10, 19 for 15 and 25 for 20.
Length: 0.5 to 20 seconds. If no length is given, it makes 5 seconds.
When you pay: after the sound effect is delivered. If it fails, nothing is charged.

UGC Studio character voices

A UGC character speaks in its own voice. Hear it plays the typed line in that voice before you spend anything, and it is free: up to 600 characters a line and 40 previews an hour.

The voice for a voiceover take is free too and shares the same hourly limit; a take's line can run up to 45 seconds. You pay for the take, not the voice: on a photo the face is animated at 20 credits a second at 720p, billed on the measured length of the voice. A 10 second line costs 200 credits. For talking videos and Exact voice pricing, see Composer.

What every model costs in credits lists these rows alongside every image and video model.
AetherWave MCP overview lists every MCP tool.