ElevenLabs Free Plan Limits: Credits, Voices and Commercial Use

Short answer: ElevenLabs’ free plan gives you 10,000 credits a month, which on the website means roughly 10,000 characters of text to speech. You can generate, design voices and publish, but only for non-commercial use, and anything you share must credit ElevenLabs in the title. There is no voice cloning and no commercial license. Both start on the Starter plan, which the pricing page listed at $6 a month.

This guide is for creators deciding whether the free plan is enough for a YouTube channel, a podcast, a client job or just testing. Everything below comes from ElevenLabs’ own pricing page, help center, billing docs and terms of service, all read on November 9, 2026. ElevenLabs changes its plans often, so check the linked pages before you rely on a number.

What the free plan includes

ElevenLabs’ pricing page, read on November 9, 2026, listed the Free plan at $0 a month with “10k credits per month.” Its feature list included text to speech, speech to text, sound effects, voice design, music, image tools and “3 Projects in Studio.”

What the free plan did not list is just as useful. Commercial License, Instant Voice Cloning and Dubbing Studio were all shown as starting on Starter.

A few more details come from ElevenLabs’ billing documentation, read the same day:

• New accounts are “automatically assigned to the free tier.”
• Free accounts get “three custom voice slots” for voices you make with Voice Design.
• “Cloning is only available on the Starter tier and above.”

How far 10,000 credits go

Credits are the meter, so the useful question is what one credit buys. ElevenLabs’ help article Have characters changed? says that on the website, “each text ‘character’ you generate into speech will consume 1 credit.” A separate help article confirms the same rate for the Eleven v3 model. Two details can change that:

• Library voices can cost more. The same article notes that “some shared voices in our Voice Library have a custom rate that applies a multiplier to your credit consumption.” Check the voice’s rate before you pick it for a long script.
• API pricing is different. ElevenLabs says API generations are discounted and points to its separate API pricing page. If you plan to call the API, read that page rather than assuming the website rate.

At one credit per character, 10,000 credits is 10,000 characters, spaces and punctuation included. That is about 1,500 to 1,700 words of English, depending on how long your words are. A typical 8-minute YouTube voiceover script runs longer than that, so the free plan covers a short video or a few test takes, not a weekly upload. Re-generating a line you didn’t like spends credits again, so real usage is usually lower than the raw number.

Other ElevenLabs tools such as sound effects, music and speech to text also draw on credits. If you use them, the 10,000 goes less far for voiceover.

Commercial use and the attribution rule

This is the part of the free plan that matters most if you publish anything.

ElevenLabs’ terms of service, last updated October 9, 2026 according to the page, say in Section 1(c) that free users “may only use the Services for non-commercial purposes.” Paid users may use them commercially.

The help article Can I publish the content I generate on the platform? spells out what that means in practice:

• The free plan “does not include a commercial license and cannot be used for any commercial purpose.”
• If you publish free-plan content non-commercially, you must attribute it to ElevenLabs by including “elevenlabs.io” or “11.ai” in the title. For Eleven Music on the free plan, the article says to reference “Eleven Music” instead.
• “All paid plans include a commercial license, provided you’re not using Beta Services.”

Neither page defines “commercial” in detail. A monetized YouTube channel, sponsored content, client work and ads are the obvious cases to treat as commercial. If you are unsure about a borderline use, ask ElevenLabs or start on a paid plan. For how the major platforms treat synthetic voices separately from the license, see YouTube’s synthetic content disclosure rules.

Upgrading later does not fix old free-plan audio

A common assumption is that you can make audio on the free plan and pay later once a video earns money. ElevenLabs’ help article says otherwise.

Content generated during a paid subscription can be used commercially “and indefinitely.” Content created outside a paid subscription, “before or after,” cannot be used commercially and always needs attribution when shared non-commercially.

In plain terms:

• Audio made on Free stays non-commercial, even if you upgrade next month.
• Audio made while you were on Starter or above keeps its commercial license after you cancel.
• Audio made after you drop back to Free is non-commercial again.

So if a project might be monetized, generate the final audio while subscribed. Re-generating the script on a paid plan is the clean way to fix older free-plan files.

Free vs Starter vs Creator

The table below uses the pricing page and billing docs as read on November 9, 2026. Prices are monthly list prices; the pricing page also showed a discounted first month for the paid plans at the time.

The jump from Free to Starter is where the license, instant cloning and dubbing arrive, and Studio projects go from 3 to 20. The jump to Creator mostly buys more credits and professional voice cloning. For how credit-based pricing compares with per-minute and per-character pricing across voice tools, see what AI voice credits actually buy.

Rollover, resets and what happens when you cancel

The billing documentation covers how credits behave:

• Credits on self-serve plans “will reset each month.”
• On paid plans, unused credits roll over “up to a maximum of two months’ worth of credits,” as long as you don’t cancel or downgrade.
• If you cancel or downgrade, the change takes effect at the end of the billing cycle, “and unused credits are not rolled over.” Cancelling moves the account to Free.
• Pay As You Go credits, where available, “last for 12 months.”

The terms of service add that closed or terminated accounts “will forfeit all unused credits.” The billing docs describe rollover in the context of paid subscriptions and do not say whether free credits roll over, so the safe plan is to treat each month’s 10,000 as use-it-or-lose-it.

What to check before you pay

1. Decide whether the project is commercial. If it is monetized, sponsored, for a client or an ad, the free plan is out under ElevenLabs’ own terms.
2. Count your characters. Paste a real script into a character counter. Multiply by your monthly output and add room for retakes.
3. Check the voice’s rate. A Voice Library voice with a custom multiplier can drain credits faster than the headline number suggests.
4. Check cloning consent. If you plan to clone a voice on Starter, make sure you have the rights to it. The consent rules for AI voice cloning covers what ElevenLabs and the law expect.
5. Generate finals while subscribed. Commercial rights attach to when the audio was made, not when you started paying.
6. Read the plan page on the day you buy. Credit amounts and prices have changed before.

If you are comparing ElevenLabs with other tools’ free tiers, our overview of free AI voice generator limits explains the different meters vendors use. If the free plan is for a video project, the same “free but restricted” pattern shows up in HeyGen’s free plan limits. And if you’re unsure whether a synthetic voice suits the content at all, read when not to use AI voice first. More guides are under AI voice.

Bottom line

ElevenLabs’ free plan is a real test bed: 10,000 credits a month, voice design and Studio projects, enough to judge the voices on your own script. It is not a publishing plan for anything that earns money. The terms limit free output to non-commercial use with ElevenLabs credited in the title, and upgrading later does not clear audio you already made. If a project might be monetized, generate the final audio on Starter or above.