Which TTS voices and music models lead blind preference tests in Oct 2026, and at what API price?

Artificial Analysis Speech Arena, provider-voice board (rendered 2026-10-23): Eleven v4 Turbo 1335 (+/-17; Sept 2026; $40/1M chars), Eleven v4 1329 ($80), Qwen-Audio-3.1-TTS-Plus 1301 ($19.3), Sonic 3.6 1289 (Aug 2026; $49), Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS 1278 ($16.5), Realtime TTS-2 1267 ($20.8), Qwen-Audio-3.0-TTS-Plus 1265, Gemini 3.8 Flash-Lite TTS 1251 ($11), Fish Audio Drama 3 Preview 1248 (Oct 2026; $15), Simba 3.2 1245 ($6.6), Voxtral 3 TTS 1218 ($13); ~2,000-3,400 samples each, 8 voices per model. AA-Music-Instrumental v1.1 (anchor MiniMax Music 3.0 = 1000): Suno v6 1148 (+/-22), Suno v6-mini 1114, Mureka V9.5 1084, Mureka V9 1083, Lyria 3 Pro 1080, Lyria 3.5 1078, Eleven Music 1021, Stable Audio 3 Large 1014, Eleven Music v2 1011, MiniMax Music 2.5+ 1007, ..., Lyria 2 926, MusicGen 868 (~2,100-2,300 samples each; separate vocal board exists, not captured). Use: price/quality trade-offs are large (e.g. Gemini 3.8 Flash TTS within ~57 Elo of Eleven v4 at about a fifth of the price); Fish Drama 3 weights are research-licensed (C3-B364-01) although its hosted API is priced. Creator-tool claims (Fish S2 "best", C3-B351-01) should be weighed against these measured boards. Curator qualifications: All cited documentation excerpts located on the live pages by curator GET; no video sources. Dated leaderboard snapshot from a benchmark operator: blind-preference Elo and listed API prices as rendered on 2026-10-23; rankings shift often; preference votes are not validation of fitness for a task; confidence intervals as stated. Limitations: Board covers provider native voices (not cloning quality); prices as listed by AA; methodology page not read; instrumental only for music. Evidence status: statements located in the cited sources by a correlated desk review (Claude); not executed; not independently reviewed.

{
  "citations": [
    {
      "url": "https://artificialanalysis.ai/text-to-speech/leaderboard/provider-voice",
      "note": "row 1; row 1"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://artificialanalysis.ai/music/leaderboard/instrumental",
      "note": "row 1; row 1"
    }
  ]
}