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ElevenAPI quickstart

Learn how to make your first ElevenLabs API request.

By the end of this guide you will have a working script that sends a text string to the ElevenLabs API and plays the returned audio through your speakers. You will learn how to authenticate with an API key, install the SDK, and make your first text-to-speech request.

For guides covering other capabilities — streaming, voice cloning, speech-to-text — see the Tutorials section.

Use the ElevenLabs text-to-speech skill to generate speech from your AI coding assistant:

npx skills add elevenlabs/skills --skill text-to-speech

Using the Text to Speech API

1

Create an API key

Create an API key in the dashboard here, which you’ll use to securely access the API.

Store the key as a managed secret and pass it to the SDKs either as a environment variable via an .env file, or directly in your app’s configuration depending on your preference.

.env
ELEVENLABS_API_KEY=<your_api_key_here>
2

Install the SDK

We’ll also use the dotenv library to load our API key from an environment variable.

pip install elevenlabs
pip install python-dotenv

To play the audio through your speakers, you may be prompted to install MPV and/or ffmpeg.

3

Make your first request

Create a new file named example.py or example.mts, depending on your language of choice and add the following code:

from dotenv import load_dotenv
from elevenlabs.client import ElevenLabs
from elevenlabs.play import play
import os
load_dotenv()
elevenlabs = ElevenLabs(
  api_key=os.getenv("ELEVENLABS_API_KEY"),
)
audio = elevenlabs.text_to_speech.convert(
    text="The first move is what sets everything in motion.",
    voice_id="JBFqnCBsd6RMkjVDRZzb",  # "George" - browse voices at elevenlabs.io/app/voice-library
    model_id="eleven_v3",
    output_format="mp3_44100_128",
)
play(audio)

Then run it:

python example.py

You should hear the audio play through your speakers.

Next steps

Stream audio

Reduce latency by streaming audio as it generates rather than waiting for the complete file

Browse voices

Explore 10,000+ voices and swap the example voice ID for one that fits your use case

Clone a voice

Create a custom voice from a short audio recording