Best AI Tool to Turn Your Book into an Audiobook: Top Picks & How to Choose

Turning your book into an audiobook used to mean hiring a narrator, booking studio time, and spending weeks on production. Today, artificial intelligence makes the process faster, more affordable, and more accessible for authors of all kinds. In this guide, we’ll explore the best AI tools for creating audiobooks, what to look for when choosing one, and how to make sure your finished product sounds professional.

‍

Contents

• Why use AI to turn a book into an audiobook?
• What to look for in an AI audiobook tool
• Top AI tools to convert books into audiobooks
  
  • ElevenLabs
  • Narakeet
  • Speechify
  • Murf AI
  • Respeecher
  • Audie
  • Others & emerging systems
• Step-by-step: How to convert your book into an audiobook with AI
• Common challenges & how to mitigate them
• Legal, platform & distribution considerations
• Future directions in AI audiobook generation
• Conclusion & recommendation‍

‍

‍

Why use AI to turn a book into an audiobook?

Producing an audiobook via human narration involves casting, scheduling studio time, editing, and often significant cost and time. AI-driven text-to-speech (TTS) and voice synthesis reduce many of those barriers.

Key benefits:

• Speed – You can often get a narrated version within hours rather than weeks.
• Cost reduction – No need for a full voice acting team and studio overhead.
• Flexibility – You can tweak voice, pacing, pronunciation, and re-generate small sections without re-recording everything.
• Scalability & iteration – Good for authors who want to test multiple voices, languages, or minor updates.

However, AI narration still struggles with emotional nuance, dialog cues, accents, or character differentiation — especially in fiction. Recent research (e.g. DeepDubbing, Dopamine Audiobook) is exploring more expressive, context-aware models.

‍

What to look for in an AI audiobook tool

Before choosing, evaluate the tool based on:

‍

‍

Top AI tools to convert books into audiobooks

ElevenLabs

ElevenLabs lets you generate an entire audiobook with a single click and offers a variety of voices and styles. Their Projects feature is popular for turning long-form content into audio, and they also provide voice cloning and fine control over speech style. Explore ElevenLabs

Pros: polished voices, strong expressiveness, voice cloning, good editing control
Cons: pricing can add up for long books, dialogue still less nuanced than human narration

‍

Narakeet

Narakeet supports converting Word, EPUB, or PDF into audiobooks. They offer 800 voices in 100 languages and let you export to MP3, WAV, or M4A. It’s especially useful for multilingual authors. Explore Narakeet

Pros: wide voice/language library, supports multiple file formats, simple workflow
Cons: voices sometimes sound less natural compared to premium providers, limited advanced editing tools

‍

Speechify

Speechify is widely known as a TTS and reading app. While it’s often used for accessibility or listening to documents, it can be adapted for audiobook creation. Explore Speechify

Pros: easy to use, good mobile app integration, OCR support (scan printed text)
Cons: less control over pacing/intonation, not specifically designed for professional audiobook publishing

‍

Murf AI

Murf is built for professional voiceovers and lets you upload your manuscript, select a narrator voice, and adjust tone, pitch, and pauses. Explore Murf AI

Pros: strong customization tools, clean interface, suited for longer projects
Cons: fewer voice options than ElevenLabs or Narakeet, costs scale quickly for large books

‍

Respeecher

Respeecher specializes in voice cloning and custom TTS for audio production, making it appealing if you want a narrator with a unique or branded voice. Explore Respeecher

Pros: high-quality voice cloning, custom voice options, professional-grade output
Cons: geared more toward studios and teams, setup can be more complex than other tools

‍

Audie

Audie is specifically designed for turning books into audiobooks using AI. It offers both pre-built sample voices and the ability to clone your own. Explore Audie

Pros: built with authors in mind, user-friendly, quick setup for full books
Cons: smaller voice library than competitors, less flexible for non-book use cases

‍

Others & emerging systems

• Amazon Polly: Reliable and multilingual, but voices often sound more robotic. ‍
• Experimental systems (e.g., DeepDubbing, Dopamine Audiobook): Pushing the frontier of expressive, multi-character narration.
  

It’s wise to test sample output for your manuscript from a few tools. Even with the same source text, voice, and pacing, one tool’s output might sound cleaner than another’s.

‍

Step-by-step: How to convert your book into an audiobook with AI

Here’s a general workflow you can follow (the exact UI may change per tool):

1. Clean and format your manuscript

• Remove extraneous formatting or footnotes you don’t want spoken
• Mark dialogue or character lines clearly
• Export into a supported input (DOCX, TXT, EPUB, etc.)
  

2. Choose your tool & voice(s)

• Pick a voice that best fits your genre
• If your book has multiple characters, decide whether to use distinct voices
  

3. Upload / import the manuscript

• Many tools allow bulk upload and splitting into sections
  

4. Adjust settings per block or globally

• Tweak pauses, pitch, speed
• Adjust pronunciation of names or jargon
• Insert breathing pauses or stronger emphasis if tool allows
  

5. Preview & iterate

• Listen to chapters and make corrections
• Re-generate small sections if needed, without redoing the entire book
  

6. Export audio

• Download MP3, WAV, or M4A
• If needed, splice or recombine in audio editors (e.g., Audacity, Adobe Audition)
  

7. Quality check & edit

• Listen to full chapters to spot stumbles
• Fix mispronunciations or pacing issues
• Normalize volume or add final mastering
  

8. Distribution & metadata preparation

• Prepare cover art, chapter markers, metadata
• Export to distribution formats/platforms (Audible, ACX, Google Play, etc.)
  

‍

Common challenges & how to mitigate them

Emotionless narration / monotone dialogue

• Mitigation: choose a tool that allows finer control or expressive voice modulation
• Break dialogue into blocks and adjust intonation manually
  

Names, acronyms, jargon mispronounced

• Use phonetic hints or custom pronunciation settings where tool allows
  

Character differentiation

• Use different voices per character if your tool supports it
• Alternatively, insert brief “tags”: e.g. “(he said, gruffly)” to cue tone
  

Long books leading to high cost

• Break into parts and batch process
• Monitor per-word pricing, choose only needed voice settings
  

Distribution platform restrictions

• Some platforms may not accept pure AI narration or demand human involvement — always check terms (see next section)
  

‍

Legal, platform & distribution considerations

Commercial licensing & rights

• Ensure your AI tool grants you rights to distribute the generated audio commercially
• Some tools have usage limits or royalty clauses
  

Platform acceptance (e.g. Audible, ACX, Google Play Books)

• As of 2025, many audiobook platforms are experimenting with AI narration. Some allow it, others require human involvement or labeling AI voice.
• Audible has announced plans to use AI voices for some audiobooks under controlled programs.

Disclosures & ethics

• Be transparent if your audiobook is AI-narrated
• If you clone a real person’s voice, ensure you have permission and comply with applicable laws
  

Updates & re-generation

• One advantage: you can re-generate chapters if you need to update text without re-recording everything manually
  

‍

Future directions in AI audiobook generation

• More expressive and emotional TTS models are in development (e.g. DeepDubbing, Dopamine Audiobook) allowing better scene context and character voices.
• Multi-character audiobooks with distinct voices and smooth transitions will become more automated.
• AI tools will gradually support more languages, dialects, and cultural accents.
• Distribution platforms may establish clear guidelines and standards for AI-narrated content.
• Real-time or on-demand audiobook generation (e.g., user sends a book, system streams a fresh narration) could become viable.
  

‍

Conclusion & recommendation

If I were turning a book into an audiobook today, I’d start by testing ElevenLabs and Narakeet, comparing sample output from my own manuscript. For multilingual or niche projects, Narakeet’s breadth is appealing. For voice cloning and expressive narration, ElevenLabs has strong reputation.

However, it’s wise not to rely on a single tool. Use pilots and micro-tests (e.g. first chapter) before committing to full production. Also, always verify that your target distribution platform accepts AI-narration or what conditions apply.

If you like, I can also generate a comparison table, sample audio snippets, or a recommended “best overall pick” version of this article. Do you want me to build that next?