Speech APIs - verified
Speech AI APIs compared: speech-to-text, text-to-speech and realtime voice
We read the speech pricing pages and model docs of 12 providers on October 18, 2026 and recorded 79 models: 39 speech-to-text, 35 text-to-speech and 5 realtime voice. Every price stays in the provider's own unit, next to the line it was copied from. Converted to dollars per hour, the 35 speech-to-text prices stated per second, minute or hour run from $0.04 to $4.50. 5 models are scheduled to retire, the first on November 17, 2026.
- Providers
- 12
- Speech-to-text
- 39
- Text-to-speech
- 35
- Realtime voice
- 5
Compare by model type
Speech-to-text pricing
Transcription APIs: batch files and live streams, priced per second, minute or hour.
35 models - 11 providersText-to-speech pricing
Voice generation APIs, priced per character, per token or in plan credits.
5 models - 3 providersRealtime voice pricing
Speech-to-speech models for live voice agents, priced per audio token or per minute.
Retiring soon
Shutdown dates from each provider's deprecation page, cross-checked against our deprecations tracker. Each badge links to the row.
- Gemini 2.5 Flash Preview TTSGemini API - Text-to-speech -Retiring 2026-11-17
gemini-2.5-flash-preview-tts - Gemini 2.5 Pro Preview TTSGemini API - Text-to-speech -Retiring 2026-11-17
gemini-2.5-pro-preview-tts - Gemini 3.1 Flash TTS PreviewGemini API - Text-to-speech -Retiring 2026-11-17
gemini-3.1-flash-tts-preview - GPT-4o mini TTSOpenAI - Text-to-speech -Retiring 2027-01-06
gpt-4o-mini-tts - GPT-4o mini TranscribeOpenAI - Speech-to-text -Retiring 2027-02-26
gpt-4o-mini-transcribe
Every provider
Each provider page lists every model with its verbatim quotes, sources and notes.
OpenAI
OpenAI
4 speech-to-text - 1 text-to-speech - 3 realtime voice
Gemini API
Google (Gemini API)
2 speech-to-text - 5 text-to-speech - 1 realtime voice
Google Cloud
Google Cloud Speech-to-Text and Text-to-Speech
2 speech-to-text - 6 text-to-speech
Amazon
Amazon (Transcribe, Polly)
3 speech-to-text - 4 text-to-speech
Azure
Azure AI Speech
4 speech-to-text - 3 text-to-speech
ElevenLabs
ElevenLabs
3 speech-to-text - 5 text-to-speech
Deepgram
Deepgram
5 speech-to-text - 3 text-to-speech
AssemblyAI
AssemblyAI
7 speech-to-text - 1 realtime voice
Cartesia
Cartesia
1 speech-to-text - 1 text-to-speech
Groq
Groq
2 speech-to-text - 2 text-to-speech
Mistral
Mistral
2 speech-to-text - 1 text-to-speech
Alibaba
Alibaba Model Studio
4 speech-to-text - 4 text-to-speech
FAQ
What is the cheapest speech-to-text API?
Converting each speech-to-text price stated per second, minute or hour to dollars per hour (our arithmetic, not the providers'), the lowest on October 18, 2026 are Whisper Large v3 Turbo (Groq) at $0.04 an hour (stated as $0.04 per hour), Whisper Large v3 (Groq) at $0.111 an hour (stated as $0.111 per hour) and Alibaba Fun-ASR (audio file recognition) at $0.126 an hour (stated as $0.000035 per second). Token-priced models (Gemini API and Alibaba) are left out because their cost depends on transcript length. Check minimums, regions and promotional rates on the linked pricing page.
How is text-to-speech API usage priced?
Per character: 27 models (Google Cloud, Amazon, Azure, ElevenLabs, Deepgram, Groq, Mistral and Alibaba). Per token: 7 models (OpenAI, Gemini API and Alibaba). Plan credits: 1 model (Cartesia). The units are not interchangeable, so this site lists them in separate tables and never converts one into another.
Which speech models are retiring soon?
November 17, 2026: Gemini API gemini-2.5-flash-preview-tts, Gemini API gemini-2.5-pro-preview-tts and Gemini API gemini-3.1-flash-tts-preview. January 6, 2027: OpenAI gpt-4o-mini-tts. February 26, 2027: OpenAI gpt-4o-mini-transcribe. Dates come from each provider's deprecation page, cross-checked against our deprecations tracker.
Which providers sell a realtime voice API?
OpenAI GPT-Realtime-2.1: $32.00 per 1M audio input tokens; $0.40 cached; $64.00 per 1M audio output tokens. OpenAI GPT-Realtime-2.1 Mini: $10.00 per 1M audio input tokens; $0.30 cached; $20.00 per 1M audio output tokens. OpenAI GPT-Live 1: $0.05 per minute. Gemini 3.8 Live: $3.00 per 1M audio input tokens ($0.005/min); $12.00 per 1M audio output tokens ($0.018/min). AssemblyAI Voice Agent API: $4.50/hr ($0.075/min). Each price is in the provider's own unit.
Verified from each provider's own pricing pages and model docs; every quote was string-matched against the page that day. Prices are shown in the provider's own unit. Values marked derived were counted by us or taken from Azure's Retail Prices API, not from a pricing page. Prices change without notice; check the linked source before you commit a budget to one.
Snapshot of October 18, 2026: 79 models, 35 speech-to-text prices converted to dollars per hour, 5 retiring.
Newsletter
Know when a speech API changes its prices
One email per week. New model releases, pricing changes and what they mean for what you build.
Keep exploring
Model API pricing and specs
First-party prices per 1M tokens and sources for every LLM.
AI model deprecations
Shutdown dates for every major model API, sourced.
Free LLM API tiers
Which APIs are free to start, with free limits and data terms.
Which TTS API to use
Our take on text-to-speech APIs for developers.