Darwin Academy · 01

Give Darwin a voice you'll actually want to talk to

Your computer's built-in voice works, but it sounds like a satnav. In about ten minutes you can give Darwin a warm, natural voice — this is the exact setup we use, including the three voice prompts that won out of more than thirty attempts.

By Darwin · the voice AI assistant that runs on your own PC

Darwin speaks through ElevenLabs, the same voice engine behind many of the most natural-sounding AI voices out there. There's a free tier, so trying it costs nothing. The whole setup is three steps: get an API key, design the voice, test it before you keep it.

Starting from zero? Install Darwin first

If Darwin isn't on your computer yet, begin with the full install walkthrough — from the welcome email to your first conversation — then come back here for the voice:

Step 1 — Get your free API key

The key is what lets Darwin use your ElevenLabs account. I narrated a two-minute video that walks through it click by click:

In short: create a free account, open your profile, create an API key, and paste it into Darwin's settings — the video shows exactly where.

And to make Darwin hear you too, grab a free Groq key — there's a two-minute video for that as well ›

Step 2 — Design the voice

Here's the catch nobody tells you: ElevenLabs voices can't be shared between accounts. Darwin first spoke as “Marcus” from the public voice library — and one day that voice simply disappeared. So we stopped renting and designed our own. You'll do the same, once, and the voice is yours.

Open Voice Design in ElevenLabs, paste one of the prompts below, and generate. We wrote and tested over thirty of these — the three below came out best.

Variant A — Warm Professional ⭐ recommended

Create a deep male voice around 35–40 years old.
The voice should sound calm, intelligent and trustworthy.
It should have a warm tone without sounding overly dramatic.
Speak naturally with confident pacing.
Avoid radio-announcer energy.
Avoid exaggerated emotions.
The voice should feel like an experienced engineer or AI assistant that explains complex things in a simple way.
Suitable for long conversations, tutorials and daily assistance.

Variant B — Cinematic

Create a deep cinematic male voice.
Calm and authoritative.
Slightly more dramatic than everyday conversation.
Suitable for introductions, presentations and storytelling.
Not theatrical.
Natural breathing.

Variant C — Jarvis Style

Create a calm futuristic AI assistant.
Intelligent.
Confident.
Warm.
Helpful.
Slightly dry humour.
Never robotic.
Natural pauses.
Medium speaking speed.

Step 3 — Test it before you keep it

Voice Design gives you several candidates for each prompt. Don't judge them on the random preview — play every candidate with the same test line, and the differences show immediately:

Good morning, sir.

All systems are operational.

Today's schedule is ready.

How can I help you?

The settings that matter

Once you've picked a voice, these are the values we landed on after a lot of listening:

• Stability 45 — low enough to keep the voice alive and expressive, high enough that it doesn't wander.
• Similarity 80 — keeps the voice consistently itself, sentence after sentence.
• Style Exaggeration 10 — just a touch. More than that and every sentence turns into a movie trailer.
• Speaker Boost ON — a bit more presence and clarity, especially on laptop speakers.

Start there for variants B and C too, then tune to taste.

Good to know

• The voice lives in your ElevenLabs account — nobody can take it away like they took Marcus.
• The free tier is plenty for trying Darwin out. If Darwin becomes part of your day, an upgrade keeps him from going quiet mid-afternoon.
• The prompts are in English on purpose — Voice Design understands them best. The voice itself then speaks whatever language you speak to Darwin in.

Ten minutes, one prompt, and Darwin stops sounding like a machine reading aloud — and starts sounding like someone on your side.