Text to speech · Èdè Yorùbá
Pāṇini TTS reads Yoruba with its tones, from fully marked text or the unmarked Yoruba people type on their phones, mixed with English as Lagos speaks it.
Sonex ló ń pè yín nípa loan yín. Ẹgbẹ̀rún mẹ́wàá náírà ni ẹ máa san kí ọjọ́ Ẹtì yìí tó pé; ẹ lè sanwó lórí app, a ó sì fi SMS ránṣẹ́ sí yín tí owó náà bá ti wọlé.
Voices
Free to play in your browser without an account, up to 220 characters at a time. To save the audio as a file, sign up free for 10,000 characters and one voice clone, no card required: the dashboard saves WAV and the API returns MP3.
Making a video? See AI voice-over for YouTube and Reels. The audio is yours to use on monetised channels.
Last verified 24 October 2026
There is no native Yoruba platform voice yet, so the playground uses Liz, a voice recorded in another language: the Yoruba text is read correctly, in that voice's accent. For a local accent, clone a native Yoruba speaker from a 10-second recording and use that voice for every clip.
Sign up free, then send Yoruba text to the API with "output_format": "mp3" and save the file, or generate clips in the dashboard and download them. Scripts longer than the playground's 220 characters work the same way.
About Yoruba
Yoruba has three level tones, and its Latin spelling can show them: an acute accent for high, a grave accent for low, and no mark for mid. Dots under ẹ, ọ and ṣ mark separate sounds. The marks carry meaning: ọkọ is a husband, ọkọ̀ a vehicle and ọkọ́ a hoe. Much Yoruba typed on phones leaves them out, which forces any reader, human or machine, to guess from context. Text with full tone marks gives the most reliable result.
Respect is built into Yoruba grammar. Ẹ, the plural "you", is used for elders and customers, so ẹ ṣé (thank you) sounds right on a business call where o ṣé would sound over-familiar. Greetings are tied to the time of day, ẹ kú àárọ̀ in the morning and ẹ kú ìrọ̀lẹ́ in the evening. Customer messages in Lagos and Ibadan mix in English constantly: account, transfer, network, data, delivery. In a market where transfers, airtime and POS payments all happen by phone, a reminder that greets the caller properly in Yoruba sounds like it comes from someone local.
Use cases
Transfer alerts, loan reminders and card-delivery calls for customers in Lagos, Ibadan and Abeokuta.
Data bundle, recharge and network update calls in the language subscribers use at home.
Narration and dubbing for Yoruba film, radio drama and short video, with one cloned narrator across a series.
Commercial use
The full wording is in our terms of service.
YouTube
Yes, AI voices are allowed. What YouTube limits is mass-produced, repetitive content: videos made from a template with little original work. Its July 2025 update renamed that rule from “repetitious” to “inauthentic” content (YouTube’s monetisation policies).
Write your own script, add your own research or editing, and keep one consistent voice for the channel. Where a realistic AI voice could mislead viewers, use YouTube’s altered or synthetic content label. The monetisation decision is always YouTube’s.
Voice cloning
Clone your voice from a 10-second recording. Your clone speaks Yoruba, and every other language Pāṇini supports, in your own voice. The language comes from the text you type, so a clone recorded in English or Hindi can read a Yoruba script.
Your accent comes with it: a clone sounds like you speaking Yoruba, not like a different native speaker. Every free account includes one voice clone. Clone only your own voice, or a voice whose owner has agreed.
API
One request returns Yoruba audio as MP3. The language is detected from the text, so no language setting is needed. Pāṇini TTS starts streaming audio in under 200 ms (time to first byte).
1curl https://api.sonexlabs.com/v1/speech \2 --header 'Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY' \3 --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \4 --data '{"text": "Sonex ló ń pè yín nípa loan yín. Ẹgbẹ̀rún mẹ́wàá náírà ni ẹ máa san kí ọjọ́ Ẹtì yìí tó pé; ẹ lè sanwó lórí app, a ó sì fi SMS ránṣẹ́ sí yín tí owó náà bá ti wọlé.", "output_format": "mp3"}' \5 --output yoruba.mp3FAQ
Yes. The playground on this page reads up to 220 characters of Yoruba at a time with no account. Sign up free for 10,000 characters and one voice clone, no card; after that it costs $0.03125 per 1,000 characters.
Yes, after free sign-up. The playground on this page plays audio in your browser only, up to 220 characters at a time, so you can check the voice first. Sign up free (10,000 characters and one voice clone, no card): the dashboard saves each clip as a WAV file with Download audio, and the API returns MP3 when you set "output_format": "mp3".
It is best to. Pāṇini reads unmarked Yoruba too, but tone marks remove the guesswork between words like ọkọ, ọkọ̀ and ọkọ́.
Yes. English words such as account or transfer inside Yoruba sentences are read in the same voice.
Liz reads these samples; any Sonex Labs voice can speak Yoruba, and you can clone a native speaker's voice from 10 seconds.
$0.03125 per 1,000 characters, the same as every language, with 10,000 free characters and one free voice clone to start.
Yes. Audio you generate, on the free tier or with paid credits, can be used on monetised YouTube channels, Shorts, Reels and in ads, with no attribution. YouTube limits mass-produced, repetitive videos, not AI voices, so write your own script and keep your edits original. The monetisation decision is YouTube's.
The audio you generate is yours to use, including commercially, with no attribution and no royalties to Sonex Labs. You are responsible for the script itself: if you read someone else's text, you need their permission.
Yes. A Sonex voice clone is not tied to the language it was recorded in. Type a Yoruba script and your clone reads it in your own voice, with Yoruba pronunciation. Your natural accent carries over, so it sounds like you speaking Yoruba.
More languages
See text to speech in every language, the full list of 250+ languages, pricing, the Pāṇini TTS API, or transcribe Yoruba audio with Valmiki speech to text.
10,000 free text-to-speech characters and one free voice clone that speaks every language, no card required. Every language is billed at the same rate.