Updated
Someone asks what you charge. Most voice actors answer with one number, and most of the time that number is wrong. It is not wrong because you guessed badly. It is wrong because the question was incomplete. A rate is not a property of your voice; it is a property of the job. Until you know what the job is, there is nothing to price.
This page sets out how a voiceover rate is built, what each part of it does, and which part to ask about when a client has left it blank. It does not settle any of these topics on its own. Each section points somewhere deeper, and to the voice over rate calculator, which does the arithmetic once you have the answers.
The four inputs
Four things decide almost every voiceover rate: union status, term, media and exclusivity. Everything else is detail hanging off those four. Name them before you quote, and most of the difficulty in pricing goes with them.
Union status
Union work is priced from published union scale agreements. Those figures are negotiated in advance and written down. You do not set them; neither does the client. Non-union work has no such agreement, so the number comes from what the market pays for comparable jobs. The two systems also differ in how you are paid, how pension and health contributions are handled, and who is permitted to hire you. Read union and non-union voiceover work compared before you quote either one.
Term
Term is how long the client may run the recording. A rate buys a licence for a period. When the period ends, the licence ends. Longer terms cost more, though not in a straight line; a second year is rarely priced like the first. If a client has not named a term, they have not told you what they are buying. Ask before you answer.
Media
Media is where the recording plays. A regional radio spot, a national television campaign, a video on a company website and an internal training module are four different products, even when they come from one script and one session. Reach is the reason. A recording that reaches more people is worth more to the buyer, so the licence costs more. Media is also the input clients describe most loosely. Pin it down: which channels, which territories, how large an audience.
Exclusivity
Exclusivity is a promise not to voice a competitor for a stated period. It is the only one of the four that costs you work nobody has offered you yet. Price it separately. Define the category narrowly and put an end date on it. A client who wants a broad category locked for a long time is asking for a lot, and the fee should say so. Any term in this section that is unfamiliar is defined in the voiceover rate glossary.
Session fee and usage fee
Two different fees sit inside one quote; confusing them is the most common way to underquote.
The session fee pays for the recording: your time, your room, your performance, the direction you take and the edit you deliver.
The usage fee pays for the licence. It is what the client pays for permission to use that recording, in the places agreed, for the length of time agreed.
The two move for different reasons. The session fee follows the length and difficulty of the work, while the usage fee follows term, media and exclusivity. A short script can carry a large usage fee; a long day in the booth can carry almost none. Quote them as separate lines so both sides can see what is being bought. Usage and buyouts covers how licences are worded, and what the word buyout actually means when a client uses it.
How each type of job is priced
The four inputs apply to every job, but the unit a job is priced by changes with the kind of work. This chart sets out how each job type is priced, in words.
Rates chart: how each job type is priced
| Job type | Usually priced by | What moves the price | Ask the client |
|---|---|---|---|
| TV and radio commercials | The spot, plus usage by market and term | Market size, term, number of spots | Which markets, and for how long? |
| Online adverts | The spot, plus usage by media and term | Media, territory, term | Paid, boosted or organic? |
| Corporate and medical narration | Finished minute or project | Length, audience, public or internal | Who will see it? |
| E-learning | Finished minute, finished hour or word | Word count, modules, updates | How are updates billed? |
| Explainer videos | Per video | Length, where it plays, paid use | Will it run as an advert? |
| Audiobooks | Finished hour or royalty share | Finished length, characters, editing | Who edits and masters? |
| IVR and message on hold | Prompt, block or session | Prompt count, number of sites | How many prompts and sites? |
| Podcasts and YouTube | Episode, series or video | Length, reuse, sponsorship | Is any of it sponsored? |
| Video games | Session block or per line | Lines, voices, vocal strain | How many lines and characters? |
| Animation and toys | Episode or product | Episode length, roles, product reach | Pilot or series? |
| Promos and trailers | Spot or batch | Station or network reach, term | One station or a network? |
TV and radio commercials
A broadcast commercial is priced as a session plus usage. The usage is the larger part, and it is set by the size of the market and the length of the term. A spot on one local station and the same spot across a whole country are different licences from the same hour in the booth. Count the markets the client names, and treat a long list of cities as the regional or national buy it adds up to. Ask the client: which stations or markets will carry it, and for how long? Usage and buyouts explains how market and territory are counted.
Online adverts: pre-roll, OTT and paid social
Online adverts are priced the same way as broadcast: a session plus usage by media, territory and term. The difference is that the media overlap. OTT and connected TV contain pre-roll, and pre-roll contains paid social, so a client who buys several is billed once, for the largest. Organic posts on the client's own channel are a smaller use, until money is spent to promote them. Ask the client: will any of it be boosted or placed as paid media? The section on streaming and paid social covers the overlaps.
Corporate and medical narration
Corporate, industrial, medical and technical narration is priced by the length of the finished audio or by the project, not by reach. The audience is usually known and small: staff, customers or specialists. What moves the price is length, the difficulty of the script and whether any of it will be shown to the public. Dense terminology and pronunciation guides add preparation time, and that time is part of the job. Ask the client: is this internal only, or will any of it be published or advertised? How to quote narration goes further.
E-learning
E-learning is long narration delivered in modules, and it is priced by volume: per finished minute, per finished hour or per word. The word count drives the fee more than anything else, and a course of many short modules takes more session time than its length suggests. Updates are the other cost. Courses change, and each change brings you back to the booth. Ask the client: how many words in total, and how will later updates be quoted? The glossary entry for per finished hour explains the unit.
Explainer videos
An explainer is usually priced per video, shaped by its length and by where it will play. On a website or a sales page it is non-broadcast work. Once the client pays to run it as an advert, it becomes online advertising and gains a usage line. That change is common and often unannounced, because a video that works on the website is an obvious candidate for a campaign. Ask the client: will this video ever be promoted as paid media, and if so where? The voice over cost guide shows how that one answer changes a quote.
Audiobooks
Audiobooks are priced per finished hour, as a share of sales, or as a mix of the two. The finished hour is the edited audio a listener hears, and it follows from the word count. What moves a quote is the genre, the number of characters, the research the text needs and whether you also edit and master the files. Ask the client: who edits and masters, and when is the deadline? The glossary explains per finished hour and royalty share. Audiobook narration rates per finished hour explains each kind of deal.
IVR and message on hold
Phone system work is priced per prompt, per block of prompts or per session. Each prompt is short, but there are many, and every one has to be named, recorded and delivered as its own file. The count of prompts and the number of sites or phone lines that will use the system set the size of the job. Later additions, such as a new menu option, are small sessions of their own. Ask the client: how many prompts, how many locations, and how will additions be ordered? The glossary defines the terms.
Podcasts and YouTube
Podcast intros and outros, and narration for YouTube channels, are priced per episode, per series or per video. An intro that plays at the start of every episode is a long use of a short recording, so agree how long it may run. Sponsored content changes the job. A podcast advert or a sponsored video is advertising, and it is licensed by media, term and territory like any other advert. Ask the client: is any of this sponsored, and will the recording be reused across a series? The glossary defines host-read and dynamically inserted ads.
Video games
Game work is usually booked as a session block of set hours, and is sometimes offered per line. A block pays for your time and your voice across however many lines fit in it. Per line offers suit short jobs, but they rarely account for the effort of shouted, strained or combat lines. In-game use is normally worldwide and permanent, so trailers, sequels and downloadable content should be quoted as separate uses. Ask the client: how many lines and characters, and how much of it is vocally demanding? The calculator quotes game work by the session hour, and how to quote animation and video game voice over covers it in full.
Animation and toys
Animation is priced per episode, and the episode length matters: a short format and a half-hour format are different bookings. Extra voices in one session are usually counted as extra roles. Voices for toys and games are a separate kind of job, priced per product and shaped by how widely the product will be sold. Ask the client: is this a pilot or a series, how many roles will you voice, and where will the product be sold? The calculator quotes each of these as its own job type.
Promos and trailers
Promos and trailers are priced per spot or per batch, and the reach of the station or network sets the fee. A promo for one local station and a promo carried across a national network are different uses. Promo work often arrives as a steady flow under a running agreement, so agree the term and the batch size before the first session. Trailers for films or games are advertising, licensed by media, territory and term. Ask the client: one station or a network, and for how long? The glossary defines the terms.
How voice actors are paid per project
Voice actors are paid in three main ways. A session fee pays for time in the booth. A usage fee pays for the right to run the recording. A unit fee pays for volume in work where reach is not the point: per word, per finished minute, per finished hour or per prompt. Most invoices combine the first two or use the third alone. Payment usually follows delivery, on the terms written in the quote, and larger projects often take a deposit first. How to quote a voice over job shows the layout.
Why a range is the right answer
A single number implies a precision that does not exist, because rates are not published prices. They sit in a spread that shifts with the client, the region, the market and the negotiation. Two honest quotes for the same job can differ. Both can be defensible.
A range tells the client the job has a scale rather than a price tag, and it gives you somewhere to move without appearing to invent numbers halfway through the call. It also stops you naming the lowest number before you know what the job is.
So quote a range, then narrow it as the missing inputs arrive. If the client presses for one figure, give one, but attach the conditions to it in the same breath. A number attached to no term and no media list cannot be defended once the real brief turns up. That is a guess, not a quote.
What moves the number up
Reach moves it up first and hardest, which means a larger audience, more territories and more channels carrying the same recording. Term comes next, because every extra month is more value taken out of a single recording. Exclusivity follows, priced by how wide the locked category is and how long it stays locked.
After those come the practical additions. Multiple versions of the same script cost more; so do the tags, lifts and cutdowns made out of one session. A turnaround short enough to displace other work is worth charging for, and so is live direction, which costs you a scheduled block rather than a flexible one. Anything the client will still be using after the term you quoted should be quoted again. Do not absorb it quietly.
What moves the number down
The number falls for the mirror image of all that: smaller audiences, shorter terms, no exclusivity and internal use rather than broadcast. Non-broadcast work is a genuinely different product. Pricing it like an advert helps nobody.
Charity and low-budget work moves it down too, but treat that as a decision you make on purpose rather than a discount conceded under pressure at the end of a call. When a budget really will not stretch, reduce the scope instead of the rate: a shorter term, fewer channels, no exclusivity. You keep your rate intact; the client keeps the project. That is usually the better trade for both of you.
Where to go next
If you want a number now, open the VO Rate Calculator, answer the questions and read the range it gives you. How the calculator works explains each question it asks. The first three quotes cost nothing. After that it is $2.99 a month or $28.70 a year, and you can cancel whenever you like.
If a word in a brief is unfamiliar, start with the voiceover rate glossary. If the question is really about a licence, read usage and buyouts. If you do not know which side of the union line a job sits on, read union and non-union voiceover work compared. If a client has simply asked the flat question, how much a voice over should cost answers it in the terms clients expect.
For one kind of work in depth, read how to quote narration, audiobook narration rates per finished hour or how to quote animation and video game voice over. For the business side, read how to quote a voice over job. To time a script, use the voice over script timer.
The figures behind the calculator come from public and private industry sources, and are fine-tuned with input from industry experts. Sources explains that in more detail. The calculator is a reference point, not an agent and not a contract; you set your own rates independently. If something about your situation does not fit, support is where to ask.