Playground

Browse the voice library

Open the voice library, read what a voice row tells you, hear a preview, send a voice to Text to Speech and put it on an agent.

The voice library is where every voice you can use starts: the voices you generate speech with under Text to Speech, and the voices an agent speaks with. By the end of this page you will have opened the library, read a voice row, heard a preview, sent a voice to Text to Speech and put a voice on an agent.

What you need

  • An EchoNova account and a workspace. See What is EchoNova if you are new.
  • To add a voice to an agent: an agent that is not archived. See Create an agent.

Steps

Step 1: Open the library

Select Voices in the sidebar. The page opens on Every voice has a hometown, with a line above it that reads Library, the number of voices and the number of ways of speaking.

Two tabs sit at the top: Library and My voices. Library opens first, with a search box that reads Search a name, a tone or a use, a Filters button, a Sort menu and a row of dialect chips beneath it. A button at the top right, Add a voice, is described under What happens next.

Below the chips, Library has up to three sections:

  • Most used (kicker Popular): up to six voices that have been used, most used first, each with a play control. It is hidden while no voice matches your filters.
  • Every voice, by where it comes from: the voice rows, grouped by dialect. A dialect with no voices yet shows a line that reads, for example, Egyptian · coming soon.
  • Voices for what you build: one button per use, such as Contact centre or Narration and audiobooks, listing its voices. Press one to filter the library to that use.

Step 2: Read a voice row

Every row on Library and under My voices has the same shape:

Part What it shows
The orb Plays and pauses the voice's preview clip
The name The voice's display name, for example Ahmed. Press it to open the voice's details
The meta line The dialect, gender and age, for example Egyptian · Male · Middle
The description One sentence about the voice, then its tone, pace and uses
Use in Text to Speech Opens Text to Speech with this voice selected
The + button Add to My voices; it reads In My voices once added
A play control Plays and pauses the preview clip

Press anywhere else on a row to open the voice's details panel. It shows the voice's tags, Used by (the number of people) and Voice id, with Play, Add to My voices, Use in Text to Speech, Add to an agent, Copy id and Similar voices.

Rows under My voices replace the + button and the play control with a More menu. It holds Use in Text to Speech, Add to an agent, Copy id and Remove from My voices. Add to an agent shows only if your role can manage agents.

Every workspace sees the same library.

A Most used card shows the name, the tone and pace, the dialect and one use, with a play control and the + button.

Step 3: Preview a voice

Press the orb or the play control on a row or on a Most used card. The player opens at the bottom of the page and the clip starts. Press the orb again to pause.

One clip plays at a time. Starting a second voice replaces the first. Leaving the page stops it. The player's controls are described in Filters, previews and favourites.

Step 4: Browse one dialect

Press a dialect chip. The voice rows show only that dialect, and the chip stays pressed until you press it again. Each chip shows how many voices the dialect has. A dialect with no voices yet appears after the chips with the word soon and cannot be pressed.

See Dialects for what each dialect means.

Step 5: Send a voice to Text to Speech

Press Use in Text to Speech on the row or in the voice's details panel. Text to Speech opens with that voice selected and its dialect set to match, so the next thing you do is type and generate. See Generate speech.

Step 6: Add a voice to an agent

  1. Press Add to an agent in the voice's details panel, or in the More menu of a row under My voices. You see it only if your role can manage agents.
  2. A dialog titled Add voice to agent opens, with the line Select an agent to add this voice to. Type in Search agents to narrow the list.
  3. Every active agent in the workspace is listed by name, with its description under it, or Voice agent when it has none. Archived agents are not listed.
  4. Select an agent and press Add voice. The button reads Adding… while it saves. Press Cancel or the close control to leave without adding.

A confirmation reads Voice added with The voice was added to Acme Support., naming the agent you chose. If the voice is already on that agent, nothing changes and the same confirmation shows.

Worked example

You are building a support agent for Cairo and want to hear Egyptian voices first. Open Voices, press the Egyptian chip, and the rows show only Egyptian voices. Press each orb in turn and let the clips play in the player.

You settle on one. Press its name to open the details panel, then Add to an agent, type support in Search agents, select Acme Support and press Add voice. The confirmation reads The voice was added to Acme Support.

Then press Use in Text to Speech on the same voice. Text to Speech opens with the voice selected, so you can generate a greeting for the agent's welcome message with the same voice.

What happens next

The Add a voice button opens a sheet titled Three ways in. Clone from a recording takes you to voice cloning. Design from a description and Remix a library voice are marked Coming soon. Every voice you add is private to your workspace.

A voice you add to an agent appears on that agent's Voice tab under Used Voices, on the default speech settings, and it is not the default voice. Open the agent to make it the default or to tune it; see Voices and language. The agent can use the new voice from its next conversation.

A voice you send to Text to Speech is the selected voice for what you generate next. Generating speech is charged in credits; browsing and previewing are not.

Limits

Limit Value Applies to
Voices the library shows 100 Library and My voices
Voices in Most used 6 Library
Agents listed in Add voice to agent 100 active agents The dialog

Troubleshooting

We couldn't load the voices.

The library did not load. Press Try again and, if the message returns, reload the page.

No agents found.

No active agent matches what you typed in Search agents, or the workspace has no active agent. Clear the search. Archived agents are not offered; restore the agent or create one, then add the voice.

This voice was not added. Try again.

The save did not go through. Press Add voice again. To confirm the result, open the agent's Voice tab and look for the voice under Used Voices.

The orb does nothing

That voice has no preview clip, so nothing plays. Choose another voice, or press Use in Text to Speech and generate a sentence on Text to Speech to hear it on your own text.

FAQ

Does previewing a voice cost credits?

No. Previews are fixed sample clips and are free to play. Credits are charged when you generate speech or when an agent speaks.

Can I add my own voice to the library?

You can add a voice of your own with Add a voice, then Clone from a recording. It is private to your workspace and appears under My voices, not in the shared library.

Is the library different in each of my workspaces?

No. Every workspace sees the same library. What differs per workspace is which voices its agents carry.

Does adding a voice to an agent change what the agent says?

No. The voice sets how the agent sounds. What it says comes from its persona and prompt; see Write the persona.

Where do I see the voice's id for the API?

Open a voice's details panel, or the More menu of a row under My voices, and press Copy id. The panel also shows the id under Voice id. You can also fetch the voices call in the Developer API; see Text to Speech voices and options.