· reAPI Team
ElevenLabs Alternatives: Text-to-Speech APIs Compared by Price
ElevenLabs alternatives for text-to-speech: OpenAI, Google Gemini, xAI and Qwen TTS compared by price per million characters, plus an open-weight model.
The cheapest ElevenLabs alternatives for text-to-speech cost between an eighth and a fifth of ElevenLabs' newest model per character. ElevenLabs lists its v4 model at $0.08 per 1,000 characters, or $80 per million.[1] On the same unit, Alibaba's Qwen3-TTS-Flash costs $10, and OpenAI's tts-1 and xAI's text-to-speech each cost $15.[2][3][4] Google prices Gemini TTS by audio length instead, at about $0.0135 per minute through 2026.[5]
Price is only half the decision. ElevenLabs still publishes the most detail about latency, languages and character limits, and voice quality is something you have to hear for yourself. This comparison uses each provider's own pricing pages, checked on November 4, 2026.
ElevenLabs alternatives by price
| Provider and model | Billing unit | Price per 1M characters | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| ElevenLabs v4, v3, v2 Multilingual | Characters | $80 | v4: 90+ languages |
| ElevenLabs v4 Turbo, Flash / Turbo | Characters | $40 | Flash: about 75 ms latency |
OpenAI tts-1-hd | Characters | $30 | |
OpenAI tts-1 | Characters | $15 | |
| xAI text-to-speech | Characters | $15 | |
| Qwen3-TTS-Flash (Alibaba Cloud, International) | Characters | $10 | 110,000 free characters in Singapore, valid 90 days |
| Google Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS | Audio tokens | Not per character | $0.00225 per 10 s of audio through Dec 31, 2026 |
OpenAI gpt-4o-mini-tts | Tokens | Not per character | $0.60 per 1M text tokens in, $12 per 1M audio tokens out |
| Qwen3-TTS (open weights) | Self-hosted | Your GPU cost | Apache 2.0; voice design and cloning |
Sources: each provider's pricing page.[1][2][3][4][5][6]
Turning those prices into minutes
ElevenLabs equates its $0.08 per 1,000 characters on v4 with roughly $0.08 per minute, which implies about 1,000 characters per minute of speech.[1] Using that same ratio as a rough guide, the per-character options work out to about $0.04 per minute for ElevenLabs Flash, $0.015 for OpenAI tts-1 and xAI, and $0.01 for Qwen3-TTS-Flash. Google publishes its own figure: $0.00225 per 10 seconds of audio, or about $0.0135 per minute, rising to $0.0045 per 10 seconds from January 1, 2027.[5]
For a 10-hour audiobook, that is roughly $48 on ElevenLabs v4, $9 on OpenAI tts-1 or xAI, $8.10 on Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS and $6 on Qwen3-TTS-Flash. These are estimates from list prices and a speech-rate assumption, not invoices; real speech rates vary by language and voice.
What ElevenLabs still does that the price table does not show
ElevenLabs documents more operational detail than most alternatives: about 75 ms latency for Flash and about 100 ms for v4 Turbo, a 40,000-character limit per request on Flash, audio tags for controlling delivery on v4, and 90-plus languages on its v4 models.[1] If you are building a live voice agent, those latency numbers matter more than a few dollars per million characters, so measure the alternatives' latency before switching.
Its subscription plans also bundle characters for creators who use the web app rather than the API, from a Starter plan at $6 per month up to Business at $990, alongside a free and pay-as-you-go tier.[1]
Request limits change how you split long text
Per-request character limits decide how much chunking code you write. ElevenLabs lists 5,000 characters per request for v3, 10,000 for v2 Multilingual, which it describes as stable on long-form generations, and 40,000 for Flash.[1] A 40,000-character limit takes a short chapter in one call; a 5,000-character limit means splitting at paragraph boundaries and stitching audio back together, where joins can be audible. Check the equivalent limit on any alternative before estimating the work, since a cheaper per-character price can come with more engineering.
Testing a voice AI before you switch
A short test script catches most problems. Include product names and acronyms, numbers and dates, a long paragraph, and a line of dialogue with an emotion cue. Listen for mispronounced names, number reading such as "2026" or "$4.99", drift in tone over long passages, and the time to first audio if you are building something interactive. Run the same script through every option on your shortlist, since providers describe quality in their own terms and those descriptions are not comparable.
Many voice apps also transcribe speech, so price both directions. ElevenLabs lists Scribe v2 speech-to-text at $0.22 per hour, and xAI lists speech-to-text at $0.10 per hour over REST and $0.20 per hour streaming.[1][4]
Choosing among the alternatives
- Lowest list price per character: Qwen3-TTS-Flash at $10 per million on Alibaba Cloud International.[2]
- Already on OpenAI's API:
tts-1at $15 per million, ortts-1-hdat $30 when quality matters more.[3] - Already using Grok: xAI's text-to-speech at $15 per million on the same key.[4]
- Long-form audio priced by duration: Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS, at about $0.0135 per minute until the end of 2026.[5]
- No per-character bill at all: Qwen3-TTS, an open-source series from the Qwen team at Alibaba Cloud with "free-form voice design, and vivid voice cloning", run on your own hardware.[6]
Voice cloning carries consent and legal obligations in many places. Check each provider's terms before cloning a real person's voice.
FAQ
What is the cheapest ElevenLabs alternative?
On list price per character, Qwen3-TTS-Flash at $10 per million characters on Alibaba Cloud's International region, followed by OpenAI tts-1 and xAI at $15.[2][3][4] Self-hosting the open-weight Qwen3-TTS avoids per-character fees entirely.
Is there a free ElevenLabs alternative?
Qwen3-TTS is open source under Apache 2.0.[6] Among hosted options, Google lists a free tier for Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS, and Alibaba gives 110,000 free characters of Qwen3-TTS-Flash in its Singapore region for 90 days.[5][2]
Is there an Eleven Labs alternative with voice cloning?
Yes. Qwen3-TTS, the open-source series from Alibaba Cloud's Qwen team, lists voice cloning and free-form voice design among its features, and you can run it on your own hardware.[6] Get consent before cloning anyone's voice.
Is ElevenLabs worth the higher price?
It depends on whether you need its documented latency, language coverage and voice controls. Generate the same script on two or three options and compare before committing.
Where reAPI fits
reAPI does not currently offer text-to-speech. It does offer audio tools you might use around generated speech, such as the voice changer and vocal remover, on the same key as its image, video and text models. For generating speech itself, the ElevenLabs alternatives above are the direct routes.
References
- ElevenLabs. API pricing. Retrieved November 4, 2026 from elevenlabs.io/pricing/api
- Alibaba Cloud. Model Studio: model pricing (Qwen3-TTS-Flash). Retrieved November 4, 2026 from alibabacloud.com/help/en/model-studio/model-pricing
- OpenAI. API pricing (audio models). Retrieved November 4, 2026 from developers.openai.com/api/docs/pricing
- xAI (SpaceXSI). Models and pricing: voice. Retrieved November 4, 2026 from docs.x.ai/developers/models
- Google. Gemini Developer API pricing: Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS. Retrieved November 4, 2026 from ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/pricing
- Qwen. QwenLM/Qwen3-TTS repository. Retrieved November 4, 2026 from github.com/QwenLM/Qwen3-TTS