Best Sound Effects API 2026 — ElevenLabs vs Pika vs MMAudio vs ModelsLab

Best sound effects API by use case

• Clips up to 30 s with loops and 48 kHz WAV: ElevenLabs Sound Effects v2 — $0.12 per minute of audio
• Cheapest per second: Pika SFX — $0.0002 per second plus a $10/month membership
• Foley synced to a video: MMAudio — text or video in, $0.001 per second on fal
• Longest clips: Stable Audio 2.5 — up to 190 s, $0.20 per generation
• Flat price at volume, one key for every model: ModelsLab — $0.001 per second, or no per-effect charge on the $149/month plan

ElevenLabs Sound Effects v2

Clips up to 30 seconds, a loop option and 48 kHz WAV for non-looping effects — the widest feature set among the per-second APIs here. Its API price list says $0.12 per minute of audio, which is $0.002 per second; its own FAQ and docs describe the billing differently, so test the invoice on a small batch. Shortlist it when those features matter more than price.

Pika SFX

The cheapest per second we found: $0.0002, charged only for successful runs, for 1 to 20 second mp3 clips. The Pika developer platform adds a $10/month membership, so at very low volume the membership is most of the bill. Pika’s API FAQ says API outputs are licensed for commercial use.

MMAudio

MMAudio generates audio from text or from a video, which makes it the natural pick for foley that has to land on the frame. On fal the text-to-audio endpoint costs $0.001 per second for clips up to 30 seconds; Replicate runs it on GPU time at about $0.0049 a run.

Stable Audio 2.5 and Sonilo

Both handle long audio: Stable Audio 2.5 runs up to 190 seconds at a flat $0.20 per generation on Stability AI’s API (and on fal), and Sonilo v1.1 on fal runs up to 180 seconds at $0.0018 per second. Use them for ambience beds and long transitions rather than one-shots.

ModelsLab

ModelsLab runs Stable Audio Open 1.0 on its own GPUs at $0.001 per second with a $0.0047 minimum, for 3 to 15 second clips in mp3, wav or flac, in about 13 seconds per effect. On the $149/month Open Source Unlimited plan there is no per-effect charge, and the same key covers image, video, speech and LLM APIs, plus ElevenLabs Sound Effects at $0.06 per generation.

Where ModelsLab is the wrong choice

If you need clips longer than 15 seconds, ModelsLab cannot do it in one request; ElevenLabs (30 s), Sonilo (180 s) and Stable Audio 2.5 (190 s) can. If you need sound generated from a video, use MMAudio or Mirelo: our endpoint takes text only. If you want the lowest bill for a few hundred effects a month, Pika SFX costs less. And if ElevenLabs is the only model you use, call ElevenLabs directly — our ElevenLabs resale at $0.06 per generation costs more than its own API.

1. Clip length and input

One-shots under 15 seconds fit every API here. Ambience beds over 30 seconds narrow the field to Stable Audio 2.5, Sonilo and Mirelo. Audio for an existing video narrows it to MMAudio and Mirelo.

2. Your real monthly volume

Convert every price to your typical clip length and monthly count. A $149 flat plan beats $0.001 per second above about 14,900 ten-second effects a month; below that, per-second pricing wins.

3. Your own ears

Run the same ten prompts — your genre, your sounds — through each shortlisted API and listen. We have not run a blind quality test between these models, and a published ranking will not match your catalogue.