Cartesia Freemium
Cartesia provides text-to-speech (Sonic), speech-to-text (Ink) and voice agent APIs for developers, with voice cloning on paid plans. Free plan has 20K credits a month; Pro is $5 a month.
AI Tool Profile
Deepgram
Deepgram offers speech-to-text, text-to-speech and Voice Agent APIs for developers, in the cloud or self-hosted. It advertises $200 in free credit, then pay as you go from about $0.0043 per minute for pre-recorded audio.
Description of Deepgram
Deepgram is a voice AI company that sells speech technology to developers and enterprises through APIs. The home page lists four product areas: speech-to-text for real-time transcription, text-to-speech with a model called Flux TTS, a Voice Agent API that combines transcription, a language model and speech in one connection, and an Audio Intelligence API that extracts information from conversations.
Deployment can be in the cloud or self-hosted, and processing can be real time or batch. The footer links to documentation, a changelog, an API playground, a community and self-hosting guides. The home page does not list supported languages or compliance certifications, and a link to its security page could not be fetched, so check those directly if you have regulatory requirements.
Pricing starts with a $200 free credit. The Pay As You Go plan has no minimum spend and the credit does not expire. Pre-recorded speech-to-text is billed per minute: Nova-3 monolingual is $0.0043 per minute, Nova-3 multilingual $0.0052 and Whisper Large $0.0048. Streaming rates are shown at promotional levels that the page labels as limited time, for example Nova-3 monolingual at $0.0048 compared with a regular $0.0077. Text-to-speech starts at $0.015 per 1,000 characters for Aura-1. Voice Agent calls run from $0.05 to $0.163 per minute depending on configuration. Growth plans of prepaid annual credit start at $4,000 per year, and Enterprise is custom.
It is a tool for building products, not a transcription app, so expect to use an engineer or a no-code connector.
Features of Deepgram
- Speech-to-text for pre-recorded and streaming audio, with Nova-3 and Whisper Large models.
- Text-to-speech and a Voice Agent API that bundles transcription, a language model and speech.
- Cloud or self-hosted deployment, with pay-as-you-go billing and a $200 starting credit.
Frequently asked questions
Does Deepgram have a free tier?
It advertises a $200 free credit. The page does not say whether a card is required for the credit, though Pay As You Go states none is needed.
What does transcription cost?
Pre-recorded Nova-3 monolingual is $0.0043 per minute. Streaming prices shown are limited-time promotional rates.
Can I self-host Deepgram?
Yes. The site lists a self-hosted deployment option alongside its cloud service.
Website: https://deepgram.com/
Company: Deepgram
Key facts
Developer API for speech-to-text, text-to-speech and voice agents, with a self-hosted option. $200 free credit; pre-recorded from $0.0043/min. Needs engineering work.
| Pricing model | Usage-based |
|---|---|
| Free tier | Yes · $200 free credit, then pay as you go with no expiry |
| Starting price | Not verified |
| Data residency | Not verified |
| Compliance (as stated by vendor) | Not verified |
| Integrations | Not verified |
| Public API | Yes |
| Self-hostable | Yes |
| Official site | Not verified |
| Can a general AI assistant replace it? | General LLMs do not replace a speech API for bulk or live transcription; pick Deepgram when you must process many hours of audio. |
| Last verified | 2026-10-10 by editor |
Alternatives & Similar Tools
O
OpenAI API Paid
The OpenAI API is OpenAI's developer platform for text, image and audio models, billed per use and separate from ChatGPT. Speech-to-text is listed from $0.0045 per minute; no free credit is mentioned on the pricing page.
WellSaid Freemium
WellSaid is an AI text-to-speech platform for voiceovers built with professional voice actors, with an API and 50+ languages and accents. The free trial gives 3 minutes a month; Starter is $19 a month.
Typecast Freemium
Typecast is an AI voice generator with 700+ voices, voice cloning, a web studio, iOS and Android apps and an API. The Free plan gives about 5 minutes of lifetime downloads; Basic is $5 a month.
Rev Freemium
Rev offers AI transcription, human transcription and captions, plus legal and evidence tools. The free plan includes 45 AI minutes per user per month; Essentials is $29.99 a month and human transcripts are $1.99 per minute.
MacWhisper Freemium
MacWhisper is a Mac app that transcribes audio, video and meetings on your own computer using local AI models. A free tier is listed; Pro is a one-time purchase of 64 euros with lifetime updates.
Update history
- 2026-10-10 · ai alternative note updated (editor)
- 2026-10-10 · editor verdict updated (editor)
- 2026-10-10 · self hostable updated (editor)
- 2026-10-10 · api available updated (editor)
- 2026-10-10 · pricing page url updated (editor)
- 2026-10-10 · free tier updated (editor)
- 2026-10-10 · pricing model updated (editor)
Beyond the tool
Need the outcome rather than the software?