Audio Cost · for voice agents, transcription, TTS

What do voice + audio workloads cost?

Transcription, TTS, and audio-in-LLM pricing. Build voice agents, transcribe podcasts, or stream audio to multimodal LLMs.

Pricing verified: 2026-06-05 Whisper · Deepgram · ElevenLabs · Gemini
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Audio Cost full size
What this calculator does

Speech-to-text and text-to-speech cost per minute of audio.

Why use it
  • STT/TTS cost is usually billed per minute, not per token — easy to miscalculate
  • Compare Whisper, Deepgram, ElevenLabs, Cartesia side-by-side
📊 Calculator at a glance
📋 Example Workload - change any field to see your actual cost
🎤 Transcription (STT)
🔊 Text-to-Speech (TTS)
🗣 Voice agent (full loop)
🎛 CALCULATOR
🎤 Your transcription workload

Converting speech to text. Billed per minute of audio.

e.g., podcast transcription, call recordings, meeting notes. 100 hrs/mo = ~1 full-time call center agent.
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Monthly transcription cost
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Per minute
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Per hour
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Annual
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📊 Compare all transcription services
Service $/min Monthly Annual
🔊 Your TTS workload

Converting text to speech. Billed per character of text.

1M chars ≈ 150K words ≈ 800 pages. A voicebot speaking 1K words per 5-min call = 5,000 chars/call.
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Monthly TTS cost
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Per 1K chars
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Per 1M chars
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Annual
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📊 Compare all TTS providers
Service $/M chars Monthly Annual
🗣 Full voice agent loop

Transcription + LLM reasoning + TTS. The real cost of a voice bot call.

Monthly voice agent cost
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Per call
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Per minute
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💡 Breakdown per call
ComponentCost% of call
🎯 Optimization notes
    Vision cost → Text-agent cost → Text-only calculator →
    🎯 Use this result to
    📅 Schedule a call to apply this to your workload

    Go deeper

    Our playbooks on cutting this number.

    🖼
    Vision Cost
    Multimodal image pricing
    🤖
    Agent Loop Cost
    Text agent economics
    🔀
    Multi-Model Router
    Route voice calls by complexity
    🧮
    Cost Calculator
    Text-only baseline

    The calculator's an estimate. Want the real number?

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    📖 Data sources & methodology 161 text models · 9 embeddings · 24 vision · 41 audio · 8 vector DBs across 10 vendor pages · last verified 2026-06-05

    Methodology

    • All prices are USD per 1 million tokens, current as of 2026-06-05.
    • Vendor-published values have no mark. Inferred/extrapolated values are marked with * and listed below.
    • Batch API discounts are 50% off standard rates across providers that offer Batch mode.
    • Prompt caching discounts vary by provider (typically 80-90% off cached input tokens).
    • Regional data-residency surcharges (Anthropic 1.1x, OpenAI 1.1x, Google regional tiers) are NOT included in base rates.
    • Long-context pricing tiers apply when input exceeds model threshold.
    • Embedding prices are input-only (no output tokens generated).

    Primary sources

    Last-verified date is the most recent successful daily snapshot (aicost_pricing_snapshots) or, when no snapshot exists yet, the latest successful crawler run (aicost_crawler_runs). 10 of 10 vendors are currently verified. Aggregator services (TokenCost, AI Pricing Guru, etc.) are not listed.

    Anthropic
    2026-06-05
    https://www.anthropic.com/pricing
    Daily snapshot since Sep 2023 · 578 days captured
    Anthropic Docs
    2026-06-05
    https://platform.claude.com/docs/en/about-claude/pricing
    Daily snapshot since Sep 2023 · 578 days captured
    OpenAI
    2026-06-05
    https://openai.com/api/pricing/
    Daily snapshot since Sep 2023 · 579 days captured
    Google AI
    2026-06-05
    https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/pricing
    Daily snapshot since Dec 2023 · 554 days captured
    Google Vertex
    2026-06-05
    https://cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/generative-ai/pricing
    Daily snapshot since Dec 2023 · 554 days captured
    DeepSeek
    2026-06-05
    https://api-docs.deepseek.com/quick_start/pricing
    Daily snapshot since May 2024 · 493 days captured
    xAI
    2026-06-05
    https://x.ai/api
    Daily snapshot since Nov 2024 · 411 days captured
    Mistral
    2026-06-05
    https://mistral.ai/pricing
    Daily snapshot since Dec 2023 · 552 days captured
    Cohere
    2026-06-05
    https://cohere.com/pricing
    Daily snapshot since Sep 2023 · 578 days captured
    Voyage AI
    2026-06-05
    https://docs.voyageai.com/docs/pricing

    Inferred values (marked with * in calculator tables)

    Derived from industry conventions, not directly published by the vendor. Typical conventions: cached input = 10% of base (90% off), Batch API = 50% of base (50% off).

    Vendor / Model Field Why it’s inferred
    Anthropic — Claude Sonnet 4.6 cachedInput Derived at 10% of input rate — Anthropic publishes 90% cache-hit discount on this tier.
    Anthropic — Claude Sonnet 4.5 cachedInput Derived at 10% of input rate; same 90% cache-hit convention as Sonnet 4.6.
    Anthropic — Claude Sonnet 4.5 batchInput Derived at 50% of standard input — Anthropic documents uniform 50% Batch discount.
    Anthropic — Claude Sonnet 4.5 batchOutput Derived at 50% of standard output — Anthropic documents uniform 50% Batch discount.
    Anthropic — Claude Haiku 4.5 cachedInput Derived at 10% of input rate — Anthropic 90% cache-hit discount convention.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Mini cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — OpenAI documents automatic 90% discount on cache hits across GPT-5.x tier.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Nano cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — OpenAI 90% cache-hit convention.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Nano batchInput Derived at 50% of input — OpenAI Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Nano batchOutput Derived at 50% of output — OpenAI Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Pro cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — OpenAI 90% cache-hit convention.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Pro batchInput Derived at 50% of input — OpenAI Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.4 Pro batchOutput Derived at 50% of output — OpenAI Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.2 cachedInput Derived at 10% of input; no residency uplift.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.2 batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.2 batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 cachedInput Derived at 10% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.5 Pro cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — OpenAI does not publish a cached rate for *-pro models; using the family convention.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.5 Pro batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.5 Pro batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.2 Pro cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — pro-tier convention.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.2 Pro batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.2 Pro batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.1 batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5.1 batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 Pro batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 Pro batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 Nano cachedInput Derived at 10% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 Nano batchInput Derived at 50% of input.
    OpenAI — GPT-5 Nano batchOutput Derived at 50% of output.
    Google — Gemini 3 Flash cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — Google caching discount convention ~90%.
    Google — Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — Google caching convention.
    Google — Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite batchInput Derived at 50% of input — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite batchOutput Derived at 50% of output — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 2.5 Pro cachedInput Derived at 10% of input.
    Google — Gemini 2.5 Flash cachedInput Derived at 10% of input.
    Google — Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — Google caching convention.
    Google — Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite batchInput Derived at 50% of input — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite batchOutput Derived at 50% of output — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 2.0 Flash cachedInput Derived at 25% of input per Google 2.0 family caching rates.
    Google — Gemini 2.0 Flash batchInput Derived at 50% of input — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 2.0 Flash batchOutput Derived at 50% of output — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 2.0 Flash-Lite cachedInput Derived at 10% of input — Google caching convention.
    Google — Gemini 2.0 Flash-Lite batchInput Derived at 50% of input — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    Google — Gemini 2.0 Flash-Lite batchOutput Derived at 50% of output — Google Batch API uniform 50% discount.
    xAI — Grok 4 (legacy) cachedInput Extrapolated at 25% of base.

    Pricing is cross-verified against the LiteLLM community registry when available. Daily snapshots are kept in aicost_pricing_snapshots; every change is logged to aicost_price_changelog with old & new values for full audit trail. Read the full methodology →