In simple English
Voicebox is a free desktop program for your computer that lets you copy any voice from a short audio clip. You can type words and turn them into spoken audio, or speak into your microphone to type text into any program. It runs entirely on your own hardware, so your voice recordings and generated audio never go to an outside company. It costs nothing to download and use, though running the artificial intelligence models requires a reasonably powerful computer with a dedicated graphics card or an Apple Silicon processor.
What it is
A local-first artificial intelligence voice studio that combines speech generation, voice cloning, and speech-to-text transcription into a single desktop application. It packages multiple speech engines and a local language model behind a desktop interface and an application programming interface.
What it is good for
Solo builders who want to generate natural voiceovers for videos, podcasts, or applications without paying subscription fees to cloud services like ElevenLabs. It is also useful for anyone who wants a private speech-to-text dictation tool that works across all desktop applications.
- Runs completely offline on your own hardware for total privacy.
- Supports eight different speech generation engines and twenty-three languages.
- Includes a built-in server for connecting AI coding assistants to a cloned voice.
- Requires a computer with a capable graphics card or Apple Silicon to run the models smoothly.
- Linux users must build the application from source rather than downloading a pre-built installer.
- Large artificial intelligence model files take up significant disk space.
ElevenLabs and WisprFlow
Claude Code
- abi/screenshot-to-code81k stars
Another desktop-adjacent developer tool, though focused on turning visual designs into frontend code rather than managing voice audio.
- localsend/localsend95k stars
Another local-first desktop utility that keeps your data entirely on your machine without relying on cloud services.
- shaka-project/shaka-packager2.6k stars
Cuts a video file into the pieces and index files that a browser needs in order to stream it.
- mpv-player/mpv38k stars
A command-line media player that handles most audio, video and subtitle formats and can be driven entirely from scripts.
- snapcast/snapcast8.0k stars
A server and clients that play one audio stream in several rooms, kept in time with each other.
git clone https://github.com/jamiepine/voicebox.git cd voicebox just setup just dev