Stable Audio
Text-to-music and audio generation from Stability AI. Create royalty-ready tracks, sound effects, and loops with precise control over genre, mood, and tempo.
Updated 2026-04-30
Yes, within limits. Stable Audio runs a free tier with paid plans above it.
Listed pricing: Freemium.
Overview
Stable Audio is Stability AI's entry into generative music, applying the same latent diffusion approach that powers Stable Diffusion to the audio domain. It generates music tracks, sound effects, and seamless loops from text prompts, with controls for genre, mood, tempo, key, and instrumentation that give producers meaningful creative direction.
The tool is aimed squarely at content creators, game developers, and video producers who need custom audio without licensing headaches. Paid plans include full commercial rights, which makes it a practical choice for production workflows. The underlying model (Stable Audio Open) is also available for self-hosting, a significant differentiator for teams that want local inference or fine-tuning on their own audio data.
Where Stable Audio falls short compared to Suno and Udio is in vocal generation — it's primarily an instrumental and sound design tool. But for background music, ambient textures, sound effects, and loops, it produces clean, professional-sounding output with notably fast generation times.
Is Stable Audio free?
Yes, within limits. Stable Audio runs a free tier with paid plans above it.
What the free tier covers: 20 tracks per month up to 45 seconds, non-commercial use only.
Listed pricing: Freemium.
Pricing on this page has not been re-verified. The entry was last edited on , and no separate pricing check has been run since. Treat the figures as a record of what was published then and confirm on the official site.
What the free tier leaves out
Read straight off the plan list below. Vendors move features between tiers, so check the current split before you pay.
- Pro $12/mo 500 tracks/mo, 3-minute max, commercial license
- Max $36/mo 2000 tracks/mo, 3-minute max, priority generation, commercial license
Stable Audio pricing
| Plan | Price | What's included |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | 20 tracks/mo, 45-second max, non-commercial use |
| Pro | $12/mo | 500 tracks/mo, 3-minute max, commercial license |
| Max | $36/mo | 2000 tracks/mo, 3-minute max, priority generation, commercial license |
20 tracks/mo, 45-second max, non-commercial use
500 tracks/mo, 3-minute max, commercial license
2000 tracks/mo, 3-minute max, priority generation, commercial license
Pricing on this page has not been re-verified. The entry was last edited on , and no separate pricing check has been run since. Treat the figures as a record of what was published then and confirm on the official site.
Is Stable Audio worth it?
Worth it for Game developers, video producers, and content creators who need custom instrumental music, sound effects, and loops without music licensing headaches.
You can test that on the free tier before paying anything. The recorded trade-offs are listed below, and any one of them can settle the question on its own.
The 8.4/10 AI Score is an editorial read of published capability, price and shipping pace. Nobody here has hands-on hours with Stable Audio. How we verify.
Worth it if
The strengths recorded against this entry.
- Generates music, sound effects, and loops — not just songs
- Open-weight model available for self-hosting and fine-tuning
- Fast generation times compared to competitors
- Precise control over tempo, key, genre, and instrumentation
Not worth it if
Any one of these blocks your use case.
- No vocal generation — instrumental and sound design only
- Free tier limited to 45-second clips
- Track length capped at 3 minutes even on paid plans
- Output quality a step behind Suno and Udio for full music production
What sets Stable Audio apart
- Open-weight model available for self-hosting and fine-tuning
- Generates music, sound effects, and loops, not just songs
- Fast generation times compared to competitors
- Precise control over tempo, key, genre, and instrumentation
Key features
Text-to-Music
Generate instrumental music tracks up to 3 minutes from natural language prompts. Specify genre, mood, tempo, key, and instrumentation for precise creative control.
Sound Effects
Create custom sound effects and foley from text descriptions — footsteps, explosions, ambient environments, UI sounds, and more. Useful for game dev and video production.
Loops
Generate seamless audio loops optimized for background music, game soundtracks, and ambient content. Loops tile cleanly without audible seams.
How it compares
| Tool | Best for | Pricing | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stable Audio | Game developers, video producers, and content creators who need custom instrumental music, sound effects, and loops without music licensing headaches. | Freemium | 8.4/10 |
| Suno AI vs Suno AI → | Content creators, podcasters, and indie artists who need original full songs with vocals and lyrics without studio production. | Free tier + Pro $8/mo + Premier $24/mo | 9.2/10 |
| ElevenLabs vs ElevenLabs → | Creators, publishers, and developers who need realistic TTS or cloning, and teams that want Claude or Claude Code to manage ElevenLabs agents over hosted OAuth. | Free $0 (10k credits) + Starter $6/mo (30k) + Creator $22/mo (121k, first month $11) + Pro $99/mo (600k) + Scale $299/mo (1.8M) + Business $990/mo (6M) + Enterprise custom. Credits are shared across products. Annual is 10 months prepaid. | 9.2/10 |
| Udio | Music producers and enthusiasts who want radio-ready tracks with precise genre reproduction and detailed control over lyrics and structure. | Freemium | 8.8/10 |
Compare head-to-head
Comparison explorer Put Stable Audio up against any three tools Opens with Stable Audio already loaded. Add up to three more from the full index and read pricing, features, pros and cons in one table. →Related reading
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Ready to try Stable Audio?
Head to the official site to start with Stable Audio — pricing and plans are listed above.
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