A Primer on the Quickly-Shifting World of AI-Narrated Audiobooks
A guide to formats, tips, file types, royalties, requirements, and distribution options by Kristoffer Balintona
AI-narrated audiobooks are an inexpensive route for authors wanting to make audio versions of their books available to readers. We know they are not for all authors and all readers, but the market—for some authors and some readers—does exist for this option. Kris Balintona has been working in this area for some Conspire Creative clients and has pulled together this excellent primer for us. Let us know if you are interested in his services.
Introduction
There are a number of good distribution options for AI-narrated audiobooks, but the industry is quickly-shifting and the information online has many tricky edges. Below are the things authors should look out for when doing their own research, a detailed overview of many of the main distribution options for AI-narrated audiobooks, and my general recommendations.
Knowing the Market: Research tips & tricks
The industry is catching on to the bursts in progress of AI technology. Consequently, there has been a significant amount of movement in the market for AI audiobooks in the last few years and will probably change even more considerably in the next few years. For example, two of the biggest audiobook distributors were rebranded: Findaway Voices is now Voices by INaudio and ListenUp Audiobooks is now known as Lantern Audio. Information and news just three months old has become outdated: some companies that didn’t accept AI-narrated audiobooks a few months ago now might be offering their own AI audiobook-creation services.
Which leads me to Tip #1: Verify information directly through distributors’ own websites and up-to-date help articles. Articles by content creators or other authors might have out-of-date information, even if released recently, or miss nuances relevant to you.
How can you tell which details are relevant or not to you? Tip #2: When doing research, look out for nuances in phrasing and terminology. In particular: “AI-narration” vs “digital narration” vs “auto-narration.” These are used somewhat interchangeably to mean the same thing: books whose narration wasn’t created from a human. However, some distributors make distinctions, like “auto-narration” to mean audiobooks made with simpler text-to-speech (TTS) technology, not including AI technology—while others don’t.
These details matter: you might be reading articles or distribution terms that you think pertain to your recently crafted AI audiobook that actually doesn’t.
Tip #3: Most informational writing and articles about audiobooks pertains to human-narrated audiobooks, not AI-narrated audiobooks. Most of that marketing was written before the boom in AI-narrated audiobooks. For instance, most of the distribution partners listed on the front page of audiobook distributors will not be available for distributing your AI-narrated audiobook. Those distribution partners are for their typical, human-narrated audiobooks; currently, AI-narrated audiobooks will always be distributed to a significantly smaller pool of partners (hopefully that changes in the near future!). Different distribution partners for regular audiobooks—which is primarily what you will be reading—and AI-narrated audiobooks. As such, look out for distribution partners, terms, and royalties specific to AI-narrated audiobooks. If you aren’t sure what a piece of information relates to, then consider double checking or inquire.
Tip #4: Some distributors require you to create your audiobook through their own proprietary system. This means that, in such cases, authors that have already created an audiobook through a platform like ElevenLabs would need to start from scratch. (Below, for each distributor, I have noted whether this is case under the “Have to use their own proprietary AI-technology?” category.)
Tip #5: Pay attention to non-exclusivity clauses. This applies to normal, human-narrated audiobooks, too. Some deals lock you out of using other distributors to sell your audiobook. For audiobooks, most don’t, but some do (for example, ACX offers exclusivity options).
Tip #6: When doing choosing a distributor, be aware that some offer extra audiobook-creation services. An example would be BookBaby, which has options for author-, voice actor-, and AI-assisted author-narrated audiobooks.
Finally, Tip #7: Even if a distributor permits uploading a pre-made AI-audiobook, the file format needs to be right. Some distributors accept audiobooks as MP3 or WAV files (such as Spotify)—these are basic—while others only accept a special M4B file (such as Apple Books and Audible). In such cases, research whether the tool you’ve used to create your audiobook can export to the appropriate file format. (ElevenLabs, presently the most popular voice AI platform, does not export to M4B but does export to the MP3, WAV, and LPF file formats.)
Your Distribution Options
Below is a non-exhaustive list of AI-narrated audiobook distribution options. If you discover an option outside of this list, then be sure to check that they do in fact distribute AI-narrated audiobooks (Tip #3).
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