Kokoro-TTS - A lightweight text-to-speech model that supports multilingual and multi-speech style generation.

What is Kokoro-TTS?

Kokoro-TTS is a lightweight text-to-speech (TTS) model developed by hexgrad, boasting 82 million parameters. Based on a hybrid architecture of StyleTTS 2 and ISTFTNet, it employs a pure decoder design, avoiding the use of a diffusion model, thus reducing computational complexity and achieving excellent speech synthesis results and real-time processing capabilities. Kokoro-TTS supports various speech styles, including whispers and other special styles, generating natural intonation and prosody. It is cross-platform compatible and resource-efficient. Training data consists entirely of licensed/non-copyrighted audio data and IPA phoneme tags, including public domain audio, audio under licenses such as Apache and MIT, and synthesized audio generated by closed-source TTS models from major providers. Kokoro-TTS currently supports US English and UK English, providing 10 different speech packs covering different genders and speech features.

Main functions of Kokoro-TTS

• Natural intonation and rhythmIt can generate natural and fluent intonation and rhythm, and the synthesized speech sounds closer to the human voice, avoiding the stiff and mechanical speech effect that may occur in traditional TTS models.
• Multiple voice stylesIt supports multiple voice styles, including special styles such as whispers, allowing users to choose the appropriate voice style according to different application scenarios and needs, thus enriching the diversity of voice expression.
• Language supportCurrently, it supports both American English and British English, providing English speakers with a convenient text-to-speech service and meeting the needs of users in different regions for English speech synthesis.
• Voice pack selectionIt offers 10 different voice packs covering different genders and voice characteristics, such as Adam, Michael (American English), Bella, Sarah (British English), etc. Users can choose different voice packs according to their preferences to achieve personalized voice synthesis.
• Real-time processingIt has real-time processing capabilities, can quickly convert text into speech with extremely low latency, and is suitable for application scenarios with high real-time requirements, such as online live streaming and real-time translation.
• Optimized architectureIt adopts a hybrid architecture based on StyleTTS 2 and ISTFTNet, and a pure decoder design. It does not use a diffusion model, which reduces computational complexity, improves synthesis speed, and consumes fewer resources, so it can run efficiently on resource-constrained devices.
• Seamless API integrationIt provides seamless API integration, making it easy for developers to embed it into various applications, supporting text-to-speech functionality in desktop applications, web services, and mobile platforms.
• Local processingIt supports local processing, eliminating the need to upload data to the cloud. Data is entirely under the user's control, effectively protecting user privacy and data security.

How to use Kokoro-TTS

• Online experienceAccessing Hugging Face SpacesExperience the demo onlineYou can experience the speech synthesis effect simply by entering text.
• Local deployment
  • Install dependencies to ensure your system meets hardware and software requirements, especially NVIDIA GPU and CUDA drivers. Install Docker Desktop and Git.
  • Build the model and load the default voice pack.
  • Call the generation function, which returns 24kHz audio and the phonemes used.
  • Displays 24kHz audio and prints out the phonemes.

Application scenarios of Kokoro-TTS

• Audio explanationOnline education platforms can use Kokoro-TTS to generate audio explanations for course content, helping students better understand and absorb knowledge, especially for students who have difficulty with visual learning or prefer auditory learning.
• Character voice synthesisIn game development, Kokoro-TTS can generate distinctive voices for different characters, enhancing the game's immersion and the characters' personalities.
• Customer service responseThe customer service system can be integrated with Kokoro-TTS to enable automatic voice response, quickly respond to customer inquiries, and improve customer service efficiency.
• voice assistantUsers can choose different voice packs according to their preferences to customize a personalized voice assistant, making voice interaction more natural and friendly.
• Advertising voiceoverGenerate engaging voiceovers for advertising videos to enhance their appeal and impact, thereby improving advertising effectiveness.