elevenlabs-cli 0.1.8

Unofficial CLI for ElevenLabs text-to-speech API
elevenlabs-cli-0.1.8 is not a library.

[!WARNING] This is an independent, community-built CLI and is not an official ElevenLabs release. For official platform docs, visit elevenlabs.io/docs.

Why ElevenLabs CLI

  • Unified interface for TTS, STT, voice cloning, dubbing, and audio tooling
  • Script-friendly output (--json) for automation and CI pipelines
  • MCP server mode for AI assistants with tool filtering and safety controls
  • Multi-channel distribution (Homebrew, Scoop, Cargo, Docker, source)

Installation

Channel Command
Homebrew (macOS/Linux) brew tap hongkongkiwi/elevenlabs-cli && brew install elevenlabs-cli
Scoop (Windows) scoop bucket add elevenlabs-cli https://github.com/hongkongkiwi/scoop-elevenlabs-cli && scoop install elevenlabs-cli
Cargo (all platforms) cargo install elevenlabs-cli
Cargo with MCP feature cargo install elevenlabs-cli --features mcp
Docker docker run --rm -e ELEVENLABS_API_KEY=your-key ghcr.io/hongkongkiwi/elevenlabs-cli tts "Hello"
From source git clone https://github.com/hongkongkiwi/elevenlabs-cli.git && cd elevenlabs-cli && cargo install --path .

Quick Start

# 1) Set API key (or use: elevenlabs-cli config set api_key "..." )
export ELEVENLABS_API_KEY="your-api-key"

# 2) Generate speech
elevenlabs-cli tts "Hello from ElevenLabs CLI" --output hello.mp3

# 3) List voices
elevenlabs-cli voice list

# 4) Transcribe audio
elevenlabs-cli stt audio.mp3

[!TIP] Examples use elevenlabs-cli (the default binary name). If you want a shorter command, add an alias such as alias elevenlabs='elevenlabs-cli'.

Feature Surface

Area Commands
Speech tts, tts-stream, tts-timestamps, realtime-tts, stt
Voice voice, voice-changer, voice-design, library, samples, pronunciation
Content sfx, dialogue, music, dub, isolate, audio-native
Agent Platform agent, converse, tools, projects, knowledge, rag, workspace
Platform Ops history, usage, models, user, config, webhook, update, interactive
Developer UX completions, global --json, optional mcp mode

Common Workflows

Text to Speech

elevenlabs-cli tts "Ship high-quality audio from the terminal" --voice Brian --output narration.mp3

Speech to Text with Speaker Diarization

elevenlabs-cli stt meeting.mp3 --diarize --num-speakers 3

Voice Cloning

elevenlabs-cli voice clone --name "My Voice" --samples voice1.mp3,voice2.mp3

Sound Effects

elevenlabs-cli sfx "A soft UI notification" --duration 3 --output notification.mp3

JSON for Automation

elevenlabs-cli --json voice list | jq '.[0].voice_id'

MCP Server Mode

Start the server:

elevenlabs-cli mcp

[!NOTE] mcp is available in builds that include the mcp feature (for example, cargo install elevenlabs-cli --features mcp).

Minimal client config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "elevenlabs": {
      "command": "elevenlabs-cli",
      "args": ["mcp"],
      "env": {
        "ELEVENLABS_API_KEY": "your-api-key"
      }
    }
  }
}

Security options:

elevenlabs-cli mcp --enable-tools tts,stt,voice
elevenlabs-cli mcp --disable-admin
elevenlabs-cli mcp --disable-destructive
elevenlabs-cli mcp --read-only

Configuration

Default config path: ~/.config/elevenlabs-cli/config.toml

api_key = "your-api-key"
default_voice = "Brian"
default_model = "eleven_multilingual_v2"
default_output_format = "mp3_44100_128"

[mcp]
enable_tools = "tts,stt"
disable_tools = "agents"
disable_admin = false
read_only = false

Available Models

Model Best For
eleven_multilingual_v2 High quality synthesis across many languages
eleven_flash_v2_5 Lowest latency
eleven_turbo_v2_5 Balanced speed and quality
eleven_v3 Expressive and emotional speech
scribe_v1 Higher-accuracy speech-to-text
scribe_v1_base Faster, lower-cost speech-to-text

Output Formats

Format Use Case
mp3_44100_128 Default, broadly compatible
mp3_44100_192 Higher quality MP3
wav_44100 Editing and mastering
pcm_16000 Telephony and real-time systems
opus_48000_128 Streaming and WebRTC
ulaw_8000 Legacy telephony

Command Reference

Use elevenlabs-cli --help and elevenlabs-cli <command> --help for details.

Command Description
tts Text-to-speech synthesis
stt Speech-to-text transcription
voice Voice management (list, clone, edit, delete)
library Shared/community voice library
isolate Background-noise removal
voice-changer Speech-to-speech voice transformation
dub Dubbing and translation workflows
dialogue Multi-speaker dialogue generation
sfx Sound effect generation
music Music generation
agent, converse, tools, projects Conversational/agent features
knowledge, rag, workspace Knowledge and workspace management
history, usage, models, user Account/model/runtime information
config, webhook, update, interactive, completions Tooling and operations
mcp Model Context Protocol server mode

Ecosystem

Companion repositories and their README files:

Repository Purpose README
hongkongkiwi/action-elevenlabs-cli GitHub Action wrapper for CI workflows Open
hongkongkiwi/homebrew-elevenlabs-cli Homebrew tap for releases Open
hongkongkiwi/scoop-elevenlabs-cli Scoop bucket for Windows installs Open
hongkongkiwi/elevenlabs-cli-skill AI-agent skill integration Open

Resources

Support

Contributing

Contributions are welcome.

  1. Fork the repository.
  2. Create a feature branch.
  3. Run tests and checks.
  4. Open a pull request with context and examples.

License

MIT License. See LICENSE.