Deepgram pricing
Deepgram focuses on fast, developer-friendly speech APIs: Nova for transcription, Aura for text to speech, and a Voice Agent API that bundles the pieces of a voice agent into one per-minute rate.
For transcription the rate depends on whether you send recorded files or stream live audio. Recorded audio is the cheaper path, and speaker labels are included there. Streaming carries its own rate and charges extra for speaker labels. Text to speech is billed per thousand characters.
The calculator uses the recorded-audio rate for speech to text. If you stream, open the streaming model section below to see its rate. Volume commitments can lower the price further, but those terms are not public and are not included.
Some “Sign up” links are affiliate links and may earn a commission. Rankings are computed from price only and never take affiliate status into account.
Every month I transcribe of audio.
AssemblyAI and Mistral Voxtral tie for cheapest, at $3.50 a month. Azure would cost 4.8 times as much.
Estimated monthly bill for 1,000 minutes, lowest first. 7 of 7 providers fit.
- 1AssemblyAIUniversal-3.5 Pro (pre-recorded), $0.21/hr$3.50 per monthLowest priceVisit AssemblyAI
Usage $3.50 Monthly total $3.50 Works out to $0.0035 per minute.
Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- 1Mistral VoxtralVoxtral Mini Transcribe 3, $0.0035/min$3.50 per monthLowest priceVisit Voxtral
Usage $3.50 Monthly total $3.50 Works out to $0.0035 per minute.
Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- 3ElevenLabsScribe v2 (and v2 Medical), $0.22/hr$3.67 per month+$0.17, 4.8% moreVisit ElevenLabs
Usage $3.67 Monthly total $3.67 Works out to $0.00367 per minute.
Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- 4DeepgramThis pageNova-3 (pre-recorded), $0.0043/min$4.30 per month+$0.80, 22.9% moreVisit Deepgram
Usage $4.30 Monthly total $4.30 Works out to $0.0043 per minute.
Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- 5OpenAIGPT Transcribe, $0.0045/min$4.50 per month+$1.00, 28.6% moreVisit OpenAI
Usage $4.50 Monthly total $4.50 Works out to $0.0045 per minute.
Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- 6Google CloudSpeech-to-Text V2 Standard (incl. Chirp), $0.016/min$16.00 per month+$12.50, 357.1% moreVisit Google Cloud
Usage $16.00 Monthly total $16.00 Works out to $0.016 per minute.
Tiers are graduated: each band of usage is billed at its own rate (reached: Up to 500000).
- 7AzureStandard real-time transcription, $1/hr$16.67 per month+$13.17, 376.2% moreVisit Azure
Usage $16.67 Monthly total $16.67 Works out to $0.0167 per minute.
Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- Prices updated 2026-10-30.
- Priced in the "Above 0" tier; every unit is billed at that tier's rate.
- Free-tier credits are not subtracted.
- How we calculate this
Some “Visit” links are affiliate links: the provider may pay us if you sign up. That never changes the order, which is set by price alone.
Pricing by model
Nova-3 (pre-recorded) pricing
Speech to text. Deepgram's flagship speech-to-text model for batch transcription of recorded audio, with speaker diarization and smart formatting included.
| Monthly usage | Price per minute |
|---|---|
| Any volume | $0.0043 |
Nova-3 Monolingual, pre-recorded, Pay As You Go: $0.0043/min ($0.26/hr). Speaker diarization is included at no extra charge for pre-recorded audio. Growth plan is $0.0036/min (not modelled).
Source: deepgram.com
Nova-3 (streaming) pricing
Speech to text. Nova-3 over a live websocket for real-time transcription; diarization on streaming audio is billed as an add-on.
| Monthly usage | Price per minute |
|---|---|
| Any volume | $0.0077 |
Nova-3 Monolingual streaming, Pay As You Go: $0.0077/min ($0.46/hr), checked against the live page on 2026-10-30. Growth plan $0.0065/min (not modelled).
Source: deepgram.com
Aura-2 pricing
Text to speech. Deepgram's current text-to-speech model family for natural, low-latency voice output.
| Monthly usage | Price per 1K characters |
|---|---|
| Any volume | $0.03 |
Aura-2 Pay As You Go: $0.030 per 1,000 characters ($30 per 1M). Growth plan $0.027 per 1,000 characters (not modelled).
Source: deepgram.com
Aura-1 pricing
Text to speech. The earlier Aura text-to-speech generation, offered at a lower price point.
| Monthly usage | Price per 1K characters |
|---|---|
| Any volume | $0.015 |
Aura-1 Pay As You Go: $0.0150 per 1,000 characters ($15 per 1M). Growth plan $0.0135 per 1,000 characters (not modelled).
Source: deepgram.com
Voice Agent API (Standard) pricing
Realtime voice. Single websocket API that bundles speech-to-text, an LLM and text-to-speech for live voice agents, billed on connection time.
| Audio in | $0.075 per minute |
|---|---|
| Audio out | $0 per minute |
| Concurrent calls included | 45 |
Voice Agent Standard tier, Pay As You Go: $0.075 per minute of websocket connection time ($4.50/hr), one combined rate covering STT, LLM and TTS (shown as audio_in; audio_out is 0 because the rate is not split). Other tiers: Standard with your own TTS $0.065/min, Custom with your own LLM $0.065/min, Custom with your own LLM and TTS $0.050/min, Advanced $0.163/min, Advanced with your own TTS $0.122/min. Growth Standard $0.068/min (not modelled). Concurrency limit 45 on Pay As You Go.
Source: deepgram.com
Flux TTS pricing
Text to speech. Conversation-native text to speech for real-time voice agents.
| Monthly usage | Price per 1K characters |
|---|---|
| Any volume | $0.045 |
Pay As You Go and Growth are both $0.0450 per 1K characters. Deepgram offers extra credits on Flux TTS spend until 2026-12-31; not modelled.
Source: deepgram.com
Features
| Feature | Deepgram |
|---|---|
| Speaker labels | Yes |
| Languages | 45 |
| Self-hosting | Yes |
| EU data residency | Yes |
| Realtime voice | Yes |
Frequently asked questions
- How much does Deepgram speech-to-text cost per month for 1,000 minutes?
- About $4.30 a month using $0.0043/min (prices updated 2026-10-30). Free-tier credits are not subtracted.
- How much does Deepgram text-to-speech cost per month for 1,000,000 characters?
- About $30.00 a month using $0.03/1K chars (prices updated 2026-10-30). Free-tier credits are not subtracted.
- How much does Deepgram voice agent cost per month for 1,000 minutes?
- About $75.00 a month using $0.075/min audio in + out (prices updated 2026-10-30). Free-tier credits are not subtracted.
- Where does the Deepgram pricing on this page come from?
- From the provider’s own public pricing page, last checked on 2026-10-30. The methodology page lists every source and rule.