---
title: "Voice and avatar"
description: "Pick your agent's voice from the catalog, add a video avatar for face-to-face conversations, and see how a Live model changes what you can set here."
---

> Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.speakai.co/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Voice and avatar

The **Voice & Avatar** tab controls what people hear, and optionally see, when they talk to your
agent. Every agent needs a voice. An agent only needs an avatar when you turn on video.


## Conversation mode: voice or video avatar

At the top of the tab, **Conversation mode** asks "How should users experience this agent?" and
gives you two cards to choose between:

- **Voice only**: audio with a dynamic voice visualization, no camera-style face.
- **Video avatar**: a lifelike video avatar for face-to-face chats.

Pick **Voice only** for a lightweight embed or a phone-style conversation where a face adds
nothing. Pick **Video avatar** when seeing a face builds trust, such as a receptionist widget or a
product walkthrough.

Selecting a card saves the mode right away, no separate save step. Switching modes only changes
which sections appear below it: your saved voice and your saved avatar are kept independently, so
going back and forth between modes doesn't lose either one. Choosing **Video avatar** adds an
**Avatar** section above the **Voice** section so you can pick one.

## Choosing a voice from the catalog

The **Voice** section is always visible, because every agent speaks even when it isn't showing a
face. Its subheading says plainly what it's for: "The voice your agent uses to speak with users."

Until you pick one, the card reads "No voice selected" with a **Choose a voice** button. Once a
voice is set, the same card shows its name, its provider (voices come from providers like
ElevenLabs and OpenAI), and a short description, next to a **Change voice** button.

Either button opens **Select a voice**, a dialog listing every available voice with a live count
("N voices available"). From there you can:

- Search by name or description.
- Filter by provider, gender, or language, or clear every filter at once with **Reset all
  filters**.
- Preview a voice's sample clip with the play button on its tile, where one exists.
- See at a glance which voices are marked **Premium**.

Pick a tile and select **Apply selection** to save it. The change applies immediately, with an
inline confirmation once it's saved. Browsing and previewing before committing matters here:
providers and voices vary a lot in tone, accent, and naturalness, so a name alone rarely tells you
whether a voice fits your brand.

## Switching to a video avatar

Turn on **Video avatar** mode and an **Avatar** section appears, described as "The avatar that
represents your agent during conversations." It works the same way as the voice picker: "No
avatar selected" with a **Choose an avatar** button until you pick one, then a card with the
avatar's thumbnail, name, and category, plus a **Change avatar** button.

Opening the picker takes you to **Select an avatar**, where you can filter by **All**,
**Standard**, or **Premium**, and toggle **Recommended** to see only the avatars Speak AI
recommends first. Select a tile and confirm with **Apply selection**.

An avatar changes what people see, not what your agent sounds like: it still speaks with whatever
voice you set in the **Voice** section above, video just adds a face to that same voice.

## When your agent runs on a Live model

Voice and avatar aren't the only way this tab can look. On the agent's **Details** tab, the
**Model** field groups choices under **Standard** and **Live (speech to speech)**, with this
explanation: "Standard models listen, think and then speak. Live models hear the caller and speak
directly."

A Standard model is a pipeline of separate steps: transcribe what was said, reason about a reply,
then synthesize it in the text-to-speech voice you picked above. A Live model collapses that into
one step, so it needs a different kind of voice: one built into the model itself.

Pick a Live model on the Details tab and this tab's **Voice** section changes to show only that
model's own voices, with no search or filters, since there's a fixed, usually small, set to choose
from. Your text-to-speech voice isn't lost. It's kept in reserve for whenever you switch back to a
Standard model. A few settings that only make sense for a text-to-speech step, like pronunciation
rules, are grayed out while a Live model is selected, each with a short note explaining why right
underneath it.

If you've just picked a Live (or Standard) model on the Details tab but haven't saved it yet, this
tab shows a banner saying it's previewing settings for that unsaved model, and that you need to
save on the Details tab before it takes effect.

## Related pages

- [Create and manage Speak AI voice agents](/api/voice-agents/agents/): the API reference for the
  Voices and Avatars catalogs this tab reads from.

Source: https://docs.speakai.co/help/voice-agents/voice-and-avatar/index.mdx