<p align="center">
<img src=".github/assets/icon-dark.webp" alt="Voicebox" width="120" height="120" />
</p>
<h1 align="center">Voicebox</h1>
<p align="center">
<strong>The open-source AI voice studio.</strong><br/>
Clone any voice. Generate speech. Dictate into any app. Talk to agents in voices you own.<br/>
The full voice I/O stack, running locally on your machine.
</p>
<p align="center">
<a href="https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox/releases">
<img src="https://img.shields.io/github/downloads/jamiepine/voicebox/total?style=flat&color=blue" alt="Downloads" />
</a>
<a href="https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox/releases/latest">
<img src="https://img.shields.io/github/v/release/jamiepine/voicebox?style=flat" alt="Release" />
</a>
<a href="https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox/stargazers">
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</a>
<a href="https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox/blob/main/LICENSE">
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</a>
<a href="https://capy.ai?utm_source=voicebox&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=built-with-capy">
<img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/built%20with-Capy-63C8C1?style=flat" alt="Built with Capy" />
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<img src="https://img.shields.io/static/v1?label=Ask&message=DeepWiki&color=5B6EF7" alt="Ask DeepWiki" />
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<p align="center">
<a href="https://trendshift.io/repositories/21213" target="_blank"><img src="https://trendshift.io/api/badge/repositories/21213" alt="jamiepine%2Fvoicebox | Trendshift" style="width: 250px; height: 55px;" width="250" height="55"/></a>
</p>
<p align="center">
<a href="https://voicebox.sh">voicebox.sh</a> •
<a href="https://docs.voicebox.sh">Docs</a> •
<a href="#download">Download</a> •
<a href="#features">Features</a> •
<a href="#api">API</a> •
<a href="docs/content/docs/overview/troubleshooting.mdx">Troubleshooting</a>
</p>
<br/>
<p align="center">
<a href="https://voicebox.sh">
<img src=".github/assets/app-screenshot-1.webp" alt="Voicebox App Screenshot" width="800" />
</a>
</p>
<p align="center">
<em>Click the image above to watch the demo video on <a href="https://voicebox.sh">voicebox.sh</a></em>
</p>
<br/>
<p align="center">
<img src=".github/assets/app-screenshot-2.webp" alt="Voicebox Screenshot 2" width="800" />
</p>
<p align="center">
<img src=".github/assets/app-screenshot-3.webp" alt="Voicebox Screenshot 3" width="800" />
</p>
<br/>
## Built with Capy
<p align="center">
<a href="https://capy.ai?utm_source=voicebox&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=built-with-capy">
<picture>
<source media="(prefers-color-scheme: dark)" srcset=".github/assets/capy-wordmark-dark.svg" />
<img src=".github/assets/capy-wordmark-light.svg" alt="Capy" width="160" />
</picture>
</a>
</p>
Voicebox is built and maintained with [Capy](https://capy.ai?utm_source=voicebox&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=built-with-capy). A Capy Captain thread directs the project day to day, and its crew threads test, rebase, and review each contributor pull request on Linux and on a Mac Studio before Jamie merges it. Voicebox stays free and open source under the MIT license, with no splash screens, banners, or interruptions in the app.
**[Try Capy →](https://capy.ai?utm_source=voicebox&utm_medium=readme&utm_campaign=built-with-capy)** · [How Voicebox is built](https://voicebox.sh/built-with-capy)
---
## What is Voicebox?
Voicebox is a **local-first AI voice studio** — a free and open-source alternative to **ElevenLabs** and **WisprFlow** in one app. Clone voices from a few seconds of audio, generate speech in 23 languages across 8 TTS engines, dictate into any text field with a global hotkey, and give any MCP-aware AI agent a voice of your choosing.
The two cloud incumbents sit on opposite halves of the voice I/O loop — ElevenLabs on output, WisprFlow on input. Voicebox does both, bridges them with a bundled local LLM for refinement and per-profile personas, and runs the whole thing on your machine.
- **Complete privacy** — models, voice data, and captures never leave your machine
- **8 TTS engines** — Qwen3-TTS, Qwen CustomVoice, Qwen VoiceDesign, LuxTTS, Chatterbox Multilingual, Chatterbox Turbo, HumeAI TADA, and Kokoro
- **Voice cloning and preset voices** — zero-shot cloning from a reference sample, or 50+ curated preset voices via Kokoro and Qwen CustomVoice
- **23 languages** — from English to Arabic, Japanese, Hindi, Swahili, and more
- **Post-processing effects** — pitch shift, reverb, delay, chorus, compression, and filters
- **Expressive speech** — paralinguistic tags like `[laugh]`, `[sigh]`, `[gasp]` via Chatterbox Turbo; natural-language delivery control via Qwen CustomVoice; voices described in plain language via Qwen VoiceDesign
- **Unlimited length** — auto-chunking with crossfade for scripts, articles, and chapters
- **Stories editor** — multi-track timeline for conversations, podcasts, and narratives
- **Voice input** — global dictation hotkey with push-to-talk and toggle modes, accessibility-verified auto-paste on macOS, in-app mic on every text field, Whisper-based STT
- **Agent voice output** — one tool call (`voicebox_speak`) and any MCP-aware agent (Claude Code, Cursor, Cline) speaks to you in a voice you've cloned
- **Voice personalities** — attach a free-form persona to any voice profile, then Compose, Rewrite, or Respond via a bundled local LLM — agents can invoke the same modes over MCP
- **API-first** — REST API plus a built-in MCP server for integrating voice I/O into your own apps and agents
- **Native performance** — built with Tauri (Rust), not Electron
- **Runs everywhere** — macOS (MLX/Metal), Windows (CUDA), Linux, AMD ROCm, Intel Arc, Docker
---
## Download
| Platform | Download |
| --------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------ |
| macOS (Apple Silicon) | [Download DMG](https://voicebox.sh/download/mac-arm) |
| macOS (Intel) | [Download DMG](https://voicebox.sh/download/mac-intel) |
| Windows | [Download MSI](https://voicebox.sh/download/windows) |
| Docker | `docker compose up` |
> **[View all binaries →](https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox/releases/latest)**
> **Linux** — Pre-built binaries are not yet available. See [voicebox.sh/linux-install](https://voicebox.sh/linux-install) for build-from-source instructions.
> **Having trouble?** See the [Troubleshooting Guide](docs/content/docs/overview/troubleshooting.mdx) for common install, generation, model-download, and GPU issues.
---
## Features
### Multi-Engine Voice Cloning
Eight TTS engines with different strengths, switchable per-generation:
| Engine | Languages | Strengths |
| --------------------------- | --------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Qwen3-TTS** (0.6B / 1.7B) | 10 | High-quality multilingual cloning, delivery instructions ("speak slowly", "whisper") |
| **Qwen CustomVoice** | 10 | 9 curated preset voices with natural-language delivery control — no reference audio required |
| **Qwen VoiceDesign** | 10 | Builds a voice from a written description — no reference audio or preset needed |
| **LuxTTS** | English | Lightweight (~1GB VRAM), 48kHz output, 150x realtime on CPU |
| **Chatterbox Multilingual** | 23 | Broadest language coverage — Arabic, Danish, Finnish, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Malay, Norwegian, Polish, Swahili, Swedish, Turkish and more |
| **Chatterbox Turbo** | English | Fast 350M model with paralinguistic emotion/sound tags |
| **TADA** (1B / 3B) | 10 | HumeAI speech-language model — 700s+ coherent audio, text-acoustic dual alignment |
| **Kokoro** | 8 | 50 curated preset voices, tiny 82M model, fast CPU inference |
### Emotions & Paralinguistic Tags
Only **Chatterbox Turbo** interprets paralinguistic tags like `[laugh]` and
`[sigh]`. Qwen3-TTS, LuxTTS, Chatterbox Multilingual, and HumeAI TADA read them
literally as text.
With **Chatterbox Turbo** selected, type `/` in the text input to open the tag
inserter and add expressive tags inline with speech:
Sounds: `[laugh]` `[chuckle]` `[gasp]` `[cough]` `[sigh]` `[groan]` `[sniff]` `[shush]` `[clear throat]`
Delivery: `[angry]` `[crying]` `[dramatic]` `[fear]` `[happy]` `[narration]` `[sarcastic]` `[surprised]` `[whispering]` `[advertisement]`
### Post-Processing Effects
8 audio effects powered by Spotify's `pedalboard` library. Apply after generation, preview in real time, build reusable presets.
| Effect | Description |
| ---------------- | --------------------------------------------- |
| Pitch Shift | Up or down by up to 12 semitones |
| Reverb | Configurable room size, damping, wet/dry mix |
| Delay | Echo with adjustable time, feedback, and mix |
| Chorus / Flanger | Modulated delay for metallic or lush textures |
| Compressor | Dynamic range compression |
| Gain | Volume adjustment (-40 to +40 dB) |
| High-Pass Filter | Remove low frequencies |
| Low-Pass Filter | Remove high frequencies |
Ships with 4 built-in presets (Robotic, Radio, Echo Chamber, Deep Voice) and supports custom presets. Effects can be assigned per-profile as defaults.
### Unlimited Generation Length
Text is automatically split at sentence boundaries and each chunk is generated independently, then crossfaded together. Works with all engines.
- Configurable auto-chunking limit (100–5,000 chars)
- Crossfade slider (0–200ms) for smooth transitions
- Max text length: 50,000 characters
- Smart splitting respects abbreviations, CJK punctuation, and `[tags]`
### Generation Versions
Every generation supports multiple versions with provenance tracking:
- **Original** — clean TTS output, always preserved
- **Effects versions** — apply different effects chains from any source version
- **Takes** — regenerate with a new seed for variation
- **Source tracking** — each version records its lineage
- **Favorites** — star generations for quick access
### Async Generation Queue
Generation is non-blocking. Submit and immediately start typing the next one.
- Serial execution queue prevents GPU contention
- Real-time SSE status streaming
- Failed generations can be retried
- Stale generations from crashes auto-recover on startup
### Voice Profile Management
- Create profiles from audio files or record directly in-app
- Import/export profiles to share or back up
- Multi-sample support for higher quality cloning
- Per-profile default effects chains
- Organize with descriptions and language tags
### Stories Editor
Multi-voice timeline editor for conversations, podcasts, and narratives.
- Multi-track composition with drag-and-drop
- Inline audio trimming and splitting
- Auto-playback with synchronized playhead
- Version pinning per track clip
### Global Dictation & Voice Input
The other half of the voice I/O loop. Hold a hotkey anywhere on your system, speak, release — on macOS the transcript pastes straight into the focused text field. Or hit the mic on any Voicebox text input and dictate directly into the app.
- **Configurable chord bindings** — hold-to-speak and tap-to-toggle chords, each rebindable in the in-app chord picker. Holding push-to-talk and tapping `Space` mid-hold upgrades into a toggle session without a gap in audio
- **Target-aware paste (macOS)** — accessibility-verified injection into the focused text field, with atomic clipboard save/restore so your clipboard isn't clobbered
- **First-run permissions UX** — in-app gates walk you through the macOS Accessibility and Input Monitoring grants with deep-links to System Settings
- **In-app mic button** on every Voicebox text field — generation form, profile descriptions, story titles, anywhere you'd type
- **LLM refinement** — optional cleanup of ums, stutters, and false starts before paste
- **On-screen pill** — floating overlay surfacing `recording`, `transcribing`, `refining`, and `speaking` states. Same pill agents use when they speak to you, so there's one mental model for both directions of the loop
### Speech-to-Text
Voicebox runs OpenAI Whisper for transcription — the same model that backs dictation, the Captures tab, and the `/transcribe` API. Running on MLX (Apple Silicon) or PyTorch (CUDA / ROCm / DirectML / CPU) depending on your platform.
| Size | Notes |
| ----------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------- |
| Base / Small / Medium / Large | Standard Whisper quality ladder |
| Turbo | ~8x faster than Whisper Large, minimal quality loss |
More engines (Parakeet v3, Qwen3-ASR) are planned — see [Roadmap](#roadmap).
### Captures
Every dictation, in-app recording, and uploaded audio file lands in the Captures tab — original audio paired with transcript, always preserved.
- **Replay, re-transcribe, refine** — rerun STT with any Whisper size, or re-run the raw transcript through the local LLM with different flags (filler cleanup, self-correction removal, technical-term preservation)
- **Edit inline** — tweak the transcript and save on blur
- **Play as voice profile** — turn any capture into speech with a cloned voice, one click
- **Promote to voice sample** — use a capture's audio + transcript as a reference sample on any voice profile
- **Local capture storage** — original audio and transcript stay in your Voicebox data directory, with a folder shortcut in Settings
### Agent Voice Output
Every agent gets a voice. One tool call and any MCP-aware agent can speak to you in a voice you've cloned — task completions, questions, notifications. The same pill that surfaces during dictation surfaces during agent speech, so you always see what's coming out of your machine.
```ts
// In any MCP-aware agent:
await voicebox_speak({
text: "Deploy complete.",
profile: "Morgan",
});
```
Also exposed as `POST /speak` for anything that doesn't speak MCP — ACP, A2A, shell scripts, custom harnesses.
- **Bidirectional pill** — `recording`, `transcribing`, `refining`, and `speaking` are all states of the same OS-level overlay, so dictation and agent speech share one surface
- **Per-agent voice binding** — in **Settings → MCP**, pin Claude Code to Morgan and Cursor to Scarlett so you can tell which agent is talking without looking. Each client's `last_seen_at` timestamp confirms the install actually took
- **Always visible** — no silent background TTS; every agent-initiated speak surfaces the pill with the voice profile name for the full duration
- **HTTP + stdio transports** — install as a URL in Claude Code / Cursor / Windsurf / VS Code MCP, or point stdio-only clients at the bundled `voicebox-mcp` binary
### Voice Personalities
Attach a free-form personality to any voice profile — who this voice is, how they speak, what they care about. Two actions appear on the generate box when a personality is set, powered by a bundled Qwen3 LLM running entirely locally.
- **Compose** — a shuffle button that drops a fresh in-character line into the textarea; edit and speak, or click again for a different take
- **Speak in character** — a toggle that routes your input text through the personality LLM to be rewritten in their voice before TTS
Agents can reach the same rewrite path over MCP by passing `personality: true` to `voicebox_speak`, turning the tool into a text-in → personality-LLM → TTS pipeline. The same LLM backs dictation's refinement step — one LLM in the app, one model cache, one GPU-memory footprint.
**Local LLM options:** Qwen3 0.6B / 1.7B / 4B, sharing the TTS runtime (MLX on Apple Silicon, PyTorch elsewhere).
Use cases: agent dev loops (dictate a question, hear the answer in a cloned voice), interactive characters for games and narrative tools, speech assistance for people who can't speak in their original voice.
### Model Management
- Per-model unload to free GPU memory without deleting downloads
- Custom models directory via `VOICEBOX_MODELS_DIR`
- Model folder migration with progress tracking
- Download cancel/clear UI
### GPU Support
| Platform | Backend | Notes |
| ------------------------ | -------------- | ---------------------------------------------- |
| macOS (Apple Silicon) | MLX (Metal) | 4-5x faster via Neural Engine |
| Windows (NVIDIA) | PyTorch (CUDA) | Auto-downloads CUDA binary from within the app |
| Linux (NVIDIA) | PyTorch (CUDA) | Use a local/remote Python backend with CUDA PyTorch |
| Linux (AMD) | PyTorch (ROCm) | Auto-configures HSA_OVERRIDE_GFX_VERSION |
| Windows (any GPU) | DirectML | Universal Windows GPU support |
| Intel Arc | IPEX/XPU | Intel discrete GPU acceleration |
| Any | CPU | Works everywhere, just slower |
---
## API
Voicebox exposes a REST API for integrating voice I/O into your own apps and agents.
```bash
# Generate speech
curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:17493/generate \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"text": "Hello world", "profile_id": "abc123", "language": "en"}'
# Agent voice output — any app or script can speak in a cloned voice
curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:17493/speak \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "X-Voicebox-Client-Id: my-script" \
-d '{"text": "Deploy complete.", "profile": "Morgan"}'
# Transcribe an audio file
curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:17493/transcribe \
-F "audio=@recording.wav" \
-F "model=whisper-turbo"
# List voice profiles
curl http://127.0.0.1:17493/profiles
```
`POST /speak` accepts `profile` as a name (case-insensitive) or id, and resolves via the same precedence as the MCP tool: explicit arg → per-client binding → `capture_settings.default_playback_voice_id`.
### MCP server
Voicebox ships a built-in **Model Context Protocol** server so any MCP-aware agent (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, Cline, VS Code MCP extensions) can speak, transcribe, and browse captures and profiles.
**Claude Code one-liner:**
```
claude mcp add voicebox \
--transport http \
--url http://127.0.0.1:17493/mcp \
--header "X-Voicebox-Client-Id: claude-code"
```
**Any HTTP MCP client** (Cursor, Windsurf, VS Code, etc.):
```json
{
"mcpServers": {
"voicebox": {
"url": "http://127.0.0.1:17493/mcp",
"headers": { "X-Voicebox-Client-Id": "cursor" }
}
}
}
```
**Stdio fallback** for clients that don't speak HTTP MCP — point at the bundled `voicebox-mcp` binary inside the app:
```json
{
"mcpServers": {
"voicebox": {
"command": "/Applications/Voicebox.app/Contents/MacOS/voicebox-mcp",
"env": { "VOICEBOX_CLIENT_ID": "claude-desktop" }
}
}
}
```
Four tools ship: `voicebox_speak`, `voicebox_transcribe`, `voicebox_list_captures`, `voicebox_list_profiles`. Per-client voice bindings are managed in **Voicebox → Settings → MCP**. See the [full MCP guide](docs/content/docs/overview/mcp-server.mdx) for tool signatures, resolution precedence, the speaking-pill contract, and security notes.
```ts
// In any MCP-aware agent:
await voicebox_speak({
text: "Tests passing. Ready to merge.",
profile: "Morgan", // optional — falls back to the per-client binding
personality: true, // optional — rewrites text through the profile's personality LLM first
});
```
**Use cases:** agent dev loops (voice in, voice out), game dialogue, podcast production, accessibility tools, voice assistants, content automation.
Full API documentation available at `http://127.0.0.1:17493/docs`.
---
## Tech Stack
| Layer | Technology |
| ------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Desktop App | Tauri (Rust) |
| Frontend | React, TypeScript, Tailwind CSS |
| State | Zustand, React Query |
| Backend | FastAPI (Python) |
| TTS Engines | Qwen3-TTS, Qwen CustomVoice, Qwen VoiceDesign, LuxTTS, Chatterbox, Chatterbox Turbo, TADA, Kokoro |
| STT | Whisper / Whisper Turbo (PyTorch or MLX) |
| Local LLM | Qwen3 (0.6B / 1.7B / 4B), shared runtime with TTS / STT |
| MCP Server | FastMCP mounted at `/mcp` (Streamable HTTP) + bundled stdio shim binary |
| Native Shim | Rust (inside Tauri) for global hotkey, paste injection, focus introspection |
| Effects | Pedalboard (Spotify) |
| Inference | MLX (Apple Silicon) / PyTorch (CUDA/ROCm/XPU/CPU) |
| Database | SQLite |
| Audio | WaveSurfer.js, librosa |
---
## Roadmap
| Feature | Description |
| ---------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| **Windows / Linux auto-paste** | Dictation paste parity — `SendInput` on Windows, `uinput` / AT-SPI on Linux |
| **STT engine expansion** | Parakeet v3 and Qwen3-ASR joining Whisper — 50+ languages, better non-English quality |
| **Pipeline routing** | Configurable source → transform → sink chains with webhook + MCP sinks and a preset editor |
| **Streaming transcription** | WebSocket `/transcribe/stream` for partial transcripts as you speak |
| **End-to-end speech LLMs** | Moshi, GLM-4-Voice, Qwen2.5 Omni — real voice-to-voice, no text between |
| **Voice Design** | Create new voices from text descriptions |
| **Long-form capture** | Dual-stream recorder (mic + system audio) with summary LLM transform |
| **Platform sinks** | Apple Notes, Obsidian, and other opt-in integrations |
| **Plugin architecture** | Extend with custom models, transforms, and sinks |
| **Mobile companion** | Control Voicebox from your phone |
For the **full engineering status, open-issue triage, and prioritized work queue**, see [`docs/PROJECT_STATUS.md`](docs/PROJECT_STATUS.md) — a living document that tracks what's shipped, what's in-flight, candidate TTS engines under evaluation, and why we've accepted or backlogged specific integrations.
---
## Development
See [CONTRIBUTING.md](CONTRIBUTING.md) for detailed setup and contribution guidelines.
### Quick Start
```bash
git clone https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox.git
cd voicebox
just setup # creates Python venv, installs all deps
just dev # starts backend + desktop app
```
Install [just](https://github.com/casey/just): `brew install just` or `cargo install just`. Run `just --list` to see all commands.
**Prerequisites:** [Bun](https://bun.sh), [Rust](https://rustup.rs), [Python 3.12](https://python.org), [Tauri Prerequisites](https://v2.tauri.app/start/prerequisites/), and [Xcode](https://developer.apple.com/xcode/) on macOS.
The repo ships a pre-wired `.mcp.json` at the root — running Claude Code inside this checkout picks up the Voicebox MCP tools automatically once the dev app is running.
### Building Locally
```bash
just build # Build CPU server binary + Tauri app
just build-local # (Windows) Build CPU + CUDA server binaries + Tauri app
```
### Adding New Voice Models
The multi-engine architecture makes adding new TTS engines straightforward. A [step-by-step guide](docs/content/docs/developer/tts-engines.mdx) covers the full process: dependency research, backend protocol implementation, frontend wiring, and PyInstaller bundling.
The guide is optimized for AI coding agents. An [agent skill](.agents/skills/add-tts-engine/SKILL.md) can pick up a model name and handle the entire integration autonomously — you just test the build locally.
### Project Structure
```
voicebox/
├── app/ # Shared React frontend
├── tauri/ # Desktop app (Tauri + Rust)
├── web/ # Web deployment
├── backend/ # Python FastAPI server
└── scripts/ # Build & release scripts
```
---
## Contributing
Contributions welcome! See [CONTRIBUTING.md](CONTRIBUTING.md) for guidelines.
1. Fork the repo
2. Create a feature branch
3. Make your changes
4. Submit a PR
## Security
Found a security vulnerability? Please report it responsibly. See [SECURITY.md](SECURITY.md) for details.
---
## License
MIT License — see [LICENSE](LICENSE) for details.
---
<p align="center">
<a href="https://voicebox.sh">voicebox.sh</a>
</p>