# Gradium review (2026): is the free plan enough? > Real-time voice AI API for speech, transcription and voice cloning Checked Nov 13, 2026 ยท graded Nov 13, 2026 by ToolGPA. Gradium sells voice AI models through an API and a web studio: text-to-speech, speech-to-text, live voice translation, voice cloning and voice design from a text prompt. Plans are metered in monthly credits, with a free tier and extra credits billed as you go. It also publishes an open, on-device text-to-speech model called Phonon. - **Category:** AI Voices & Text to Speech - **Made by:** Gradium - **Website:** https://gradium.ai - **Runs on:** Web - **Who should skip it:** Tight if you stay free: about an hour of speech a month and no commercial use. - **Facts last checked:** Nov 13, 2026 ## Pricing As of Nov 13, 2026, Gradium has a free plan, and paid plans start at $12 per month, billed yearly ($13 billed monthly). - **Pricing model:** Free plan - **Free plan:** 45k credits a month with text-to-speech, speech-to-text and voice design, which is about 1 hour of speech. - **Free trial:** None listed. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | Free | $0 | 45k credits a month, about 1 hour of text-to-speech, with up to 5 custom voices. Commercial use is not included. | | XS | $12 per month for 225k credits, billed yearly ($13 billed monthly) | About 5 hours of text-to-speech a month, adds commercial use, up to 1,000 voices and data controls. | | S | $39 per month for 900k credits, billed yearly ($43 billed monthly) | About 20 hours of text-to-speech a month, with cheaper top-ups and lower overage than XS. | | M | $312 per month for 9M credits, billed yearly ($340 billed monthly) | About 200 hours of text-to-speech a month, adds pro voice cloning (5 pro clones) and higher concurrency. | | L | $1,480 per month for 45M credits, billed yearly ($1,615 billed monthly) | About 1,000 hours of text-to-speech a month, with 20 pro voice clones and the cheapest top-ups. | | Enterprise | Custom | Unlimited credits and custom concurrency, with dedicated inference or on-premises deployment available. | Read from https://gradium.ai/pricing on Nov 13, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with Gradium before buying. ## Ways to pay less - **One month free on yearly billing** (Annual discount): The pricing page says one month is free when billed yearly: for example XS is $12 a month yearly against $13 monthly. Source: https://gradium.ai/pricing - **Gradium for startups** (Startups): Founders can apply for $2,000 or more in credits through the startup program. Source: https://gradium.ai/pricing ## Key features - **Text-to-speech:** Costs 1 credit per character; the pricing page says about 45,000 characters is roughly an hour of audio. - **Speech-to-text:** Transcription is billed at 3 credits per second of audio, or 4 credits per second with translation. - **Live voice translation:** Speech-to-speech translation costs 30 credits per second, the most credit-hungry feature on the page. - **Voice cloning and design:** A standard clone needs a 10-second sample. Pro voice clones use 30 minutes to a few hours of audio and start on the M plan. Voices can also be designed from a text description. - **Data controls:** Paid plans add data controls such as zero data retention and a choice of EU or US data residency; the vendor lists SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001. - **Phonon on-device model:** Gradium describes Phonon as its first open, on-device text-to-speech model. ## Good for - Developers building voice agents that need streaming speech and transcription - Teams that want one vendor for speech, transcription and cloned voices ## Worth knowing - Free-plan credits cover about an hour of speech a month, and commercial use needs XS or above. - Plan credits do not roll over; only pay-as-you-go credits carry into the next month. - Beyond a plan's credits, overage is billed at 5% to 20% above the plan's own rate if turned on in settings. - Extra credits cost $7 per 100k on XS, falling to $3.80 on L. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 2.4 out of 4**, graded Nov 13, 2026. Gradium sells text-to-speech, speech-to-text, voice cloning and live translation through an API and a web studio, with a free plan of 45,000 credits. That is about an hour of speech a month, commercial use starts at $12, and credits don't roll over, so heavy use gets pricey quickly. - **Value for money: C.** Paid plans start at $12 a month billed yearly ($13 monthly), about the middle of what voice tools charge. M is $312 and L $1,480 a month for the larger volumes. - **Free plan and trial: C.** Free plan of 45,000 credits a month, about 1 hour of speech, with up to 5 custom voices and no commercial use. You'll reach that in a week or two of real work. - **Features: B.** Speech both ways, translation, 10-second clones, designed voices and data controls on paid plans. Nothing in the listing shows a gap in the job, though pro clones start on the $312 plan. - **Ease of use: C.** No store rating on record. It is an API first, so there is code to write, with a web studio for trying voices. - **Platforms and integrations: B.** Web studio and an API, deployable via Baseten and SageMaker. No desktop or phone app is listed. These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from Gradium's own pages on 13 November 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among AI voice generators - Gradium's GPA of 2.4 is higher than 47 of the 72 other AI voice generators we grade, and level with 16. - It stands best on features (B, above 44 of 72) and worst on value for money (C, above 5). - Its paid plans start at $12 a month, against a middle price of $9.99 for the category: 33 of the 50 others that charge start lower. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.7 out of 4. 4 tools score higher and cost less. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/ai-voices ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** To replace Gradium you would be making a voice model, which you can rent by the minute but not make. That is not a weekend's work, with an AI app builder or without one. It costs $144 a year. - You could not: A voice model, which you can rent by the minute but not make. - You could not: A voice model trained on your recordings. - You could not: Speech turned into text you can trust. - You could not: It plugs into other products, Baseten and Amazon SageMaker among them, and has an API. - You could not: AI features, unless you pay a model provider for each request yourself. - You could not: What a company asks for before it lets staff use something: SOC 2. - You could not: The depth: we grade its features B, which means it covers the whole job. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. ## Works with Baseten, Amazon SageMaker **Tags:** Text to speech, Voice cloning, Transcription, Public API, AI features ## Alternatives - [ElevenLabs](https://toolgpa.com/tools/elevenlabs): AI voice platform for speech, voice cloning, dubbing and voice agents. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/elevenlabs-vs-gradium) - [Cartesia](https://toolgpa.com/tools/cartesia): Low-latency speech models and voice agents for developers. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/cartesia-vs-gradium) - [Deepgram Aura](https://toolgpa.com/tools/deepgram-aura): Text-to-speech API for real-time voice agents, billed per character. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/deepgram-aura-vs-gradium) - [Rime](https://toolgpa.com/tools/rime): Voice models for phone agents: text to speech and speech to speech. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/gradium-vs-rime) - [Smallest AI](https://toolgpa.com/tools/smallest-ai): Voice AI models and agents: text to speech, speech to text, calls. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/gradium-vs-smallest-ai) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Nov 13, 2026: - https://gradium.ai/ - https://gradium.ai/pricing Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/gradium Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).