Upgrade to Text-to-Speech Neural Voice  by 31 August 2024

Text-to-Speech currently supports both standard and neural voices. However, **as the neural voices provide more natural sounding speech output, and thus, a better end-user experience, we are retiring the standard voices on 31 August 2024 and they will no longer be supported after that date.** Here is a quick comparison between Standard Text-to-Speech and Neural Text-to-Speech features： | **Standard text-to-speech** | **Neural text-to-speech** | | --------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------- | | Noticeably robotic | Natural sounding, closer to human parity | | Limited capabilities in voice tuning | Advanced capabilities in voice tuning | | No new investment in future voice fonts | Ongoing investment in future voice fonts | **Action required** 1. Review the [price](https://azure.microsoft.com/pricing/details/cognitive-services/speech-services/) structure and listen to the [neural voice samples](https://azure.microsoft.com/services/cognitive-services/text-to-speech/#overview) to determine the right voice for your business needs. 1. To make the change, [follow the steps](https://aka.ms/sttsretirement) to update the voice name in your speech synthesis request to the supported neural voice names in chosen [languages](https://docs.microsoft.com/azure/cognitive-services/speech-service/language-support#neural-voices) by 31 August 2024\. **Starting 1 September 2024**, standard voices will no longer be supported, please use neural voices for your speech synthesis request, on cloud or on prem. **Help and support** If you have any questions, get answers from community experts in [Microsoft Q&A](https://aka.ms/qna-azure-speech). If you have a support plan and you need technical help, create a [support request](https://portal.azure.com/#blade/Microsoft%5FAzure%5FSupport/HelpAndSupportBlade/overview). * Speech services * Retirements