ElevenLabs Is Bringing Voice AI in the Classroom for Free
ElevenLabs is making a bold push to put voice AI in the classroom, announcing two major initiatives on May 19, 2026 that could reshape how students and educators interact with technology.
The company is launching a free access program for professors and a voice agent built on Albert Einstein’s archives, designed to turn his ideas and writings into an interactive learning experience.
More than 100 educators across institutions including Harvard, NYU, Cornell, and UCL are already using ElevenLabs in teaching, coursework, and research. Through the new Impact Program x Professors, the company is offering professors free access to its Pro tier, along with the ability to grant time-bound access to students for specific courses and projects.
The reach of voice AI in the classroom is already showing up in real research. At University College London, Professor Carolyn McGettigan has used ElevenLabs since 2023 in peer-reviewed research on how people interpret meaning from voices, including work on synthetic speech and voice identity. At Stanford, Daniel Rubin uses the platform to build voice-enabled educational interfaces that make scientific content more accessible. At Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Sharad Goel is developing tools that let students ask questions during educational videos and receive responses in the instructor’s voice.
“Professors play a critical role in shaping how new technologies are introduced, understood, and applied,” said Mati Staniszewski, CEO and co-founder of ElevenLabs. “We’re excited to support educators to create more interactive and accessible learning experiences with voice AI.”
The reception from educators has been enthusiastic. David Orlando Niño Muñoz, a law professor at Universidad de los Andes, said the program breaks barriers that often limit how educators can design AI-enhanced experiences, noting that innovation in education is frequently held back by access issues. Christie Shin, co-chair of the Creative Technology & Design Curriculum at FIT, pointed out that student projects developed with ElevenLabs tools have already been recognised in multiple prestigious competitions.
On the Einstein front, the announcement goes further than a simple text-to-speech novelty. Through a partnership with CMG Worldwide and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, home of the Albert Einstein Archives, ElevenLabs has recreated Einstein’s voice using proprietary AI models that capture the cadence, weight, and emotion of his speech.
Einstein’s voice is now available in the ElevenReader app, where users can listen to works like Relativity: The Special and the General Theory narrated in his recreated voice, and through an interactive Einstein AI Agent where users can ask questions and explore scientific concepts in real-time conversation. Both experiences are available in English, German, French, Brazilian Portuguese, and Spanish.
Einstein joins ElevenLabs’ growing Iconic Voices collection alongside Richard Feynman, Maya Angelou, and Michael Caine.
Professors interested in joining the program can apply here, and anyone curious about the Einstein experience can try it directly.
