AI Voices for Children's Stories and Bedtime Audio

With abcVoiceover, a parent, grandparent or children's author can turn stories into audio in a voice the child knows: clone the reader's voice from a short recording, with their consent, give the characters their own voices, and download a library of stories to play at bedtime, on car journeys, or when the reader is far away.

What families and authors make

Bedtime stories in a parent's voice, for nights when they're travelling or working late.
A grandparent's voice reading favourite books, made while they're nearby and kept for years.
Made-up family stories, starring the child and the family pet, with a voice for every character.
Picture-book read-alongs by authors and illustrators, a page per line.
Stories in a heritage language: a grandparent's voice can read in any of 23 languages.

How to make a story

Make a project called something like "Bedtime stories", with a script per story.
Record the reader. Ten seconds, in a quiet room, in the warm, slow voice they use at bedtime. The clone copies that tone. See cloning your own voice.
Add character voices if you like: the reader can record a gruff "bear" sample and a squeaky "mouse" one. See voicing several characters.
Write or paste the story, a sentence or two per line, with Bear: Who's been in my cave? for characters.
Use the Calm style for the narrator, and leave longer pauses between lines when you join them, for a sleepy pace.
Download and play the files in order, or join each story into a single file in a free editor like Audacity.

A short example

Narrator: Once upon a time, at the bottom of a very tall hill, lived a small grey mouse called Pip.
Narrator: Every night, Pip looked up at the moon and wondered what was at the top.
Pip: One day, I'm going to find out.
Narrator: And the very next morning, she packed a crumb of cheese and set off.

Consent, even in the family

Ask first, even a grandparent who'd obviously say yes. Explain that it's a voice clone, and what it'll be used for.
Children's own voices need a parent's or guardian's permission, and abcVoiceover accounts are for people 13 and over.
Keep it to stories. A cloned voice should never be used to tell a child something the real person didn't say, such as instructions or promises.

Private by design

Recordings and stories are processed on the abcVoiceover team's own voice server, not sent to an outside AI company and not used to train models. You can delete a voice, a story or the whole account at any time. See the privacy policy.

Tips for young listeners

Short sentences and lots of full stops make the read slower and clearer.
Questions to the listener ("Can you guess who was inside?") followed by a pause work beautifully.
Keep sound effects out of the lines; add a soft music bed in the edit if you want one.

Children's stories and bedtime audio with AI voices