Voice Platform vs Call Platform
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ElevenLabs sells ElevenAgents, a full agent platform built on its own speech models, with 17,500+ voices in its library. If you want one vendor for speech recognition, voice and the agent, it's a strong choice.
The Difference
ElevenAgents runs on ElevenLabs' own speech and voice models, with your choice of LLM. Retell runs its own turn-taking model and its own platform voices, and you can choose other providers as well, ElevenLabs voices included. Around the models, Retell gives your contact center the tools to plan, design, test, deploy and monitor agents in production.
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Present Retell with a contact center use case, such as inbound support, outbound sales or IVR deflection, and it handles the full stack.
- Navigates IVR menus on outbound calls and at the transfer destination
- Switches tasks mid-call in Flex Mode and returns without repeating finished steps
- Briefs the human rep before a warm transfer, on Retell and imported numbers
- Remembers returning callers across phone calls and SMS with Memory
- Pushes one script change to every agent through shared Library Subflows
- Explains why a metric changed, from inside Call History, Analytics and AI QA, with Conductor
You start with one use case. Retell's FDEs help you launch it, and your own team runs it from there.
Why Retell is Different
Retell agents run the same contact center workflows your human agents do.
Mid-Call Topic Switching
Conversations rarely follow a script. A caller might jump from a question to an objection to booking. Retell's Flex Mode follows them in one flow. After a detour, the agent can pick up the earlier task without repeating the steps it already finished.
Agentic Transfers That Keep the Conversation Going
Customers don't have to start over when a call reaches a human. Retell briefs the receiving agent before the handoff. The briefing covers who the caller is, what happened and what needs attention. A separate transfer agent can talk to the destination first, then connect the caller or cancel. If the destination puts the call in a queue, Retell waits for a live person before the briefing. Callers can hear your own hold music while they wait.
Memory for Returning Callers
When turned on, Retell Memory keeps a short brief on each contact, built from past phone calls and SMS chats. The brief covers preferences, what was discussed and any open follow-ups. Any agent in your workspace can read it, so a returning caller doesn't have to repeat the story. In a conversation flow, the agent can also skip questions the brief already answers.
Conductor Builds, Tests and Investigates
Conductor is Retell's built-in assistant. It draws on more than 2,000 deployment best practices. Describe the agent you need, and Conductor will build it, write simulation tests and propose fixes. It also works inside Call History, Analytics and AI QA. There it can find the shared cause behind a set of failed calls, explain why a metric changed and summarize a QA cohort.
Your Team Can Keep Building on Retell
Retell's forward deployed engineers (FDEs) build your first agents alongside your team and train your people along the way. From there, your own internal deployed engineers take on more of the work at their own pace, until they're improving the agents directly. When a policy changes or a product launches, the employees who know the most about the change can update the agent themselves.
Overview
Built for better conversations
At scale, Retell's native IVR, SMS, and 100M+ monthly call infrastructure cover ground that ElevenLabs conversational platform doesn't match.
| Features |  | .avif) |
|---|---|---|
| Live Call Orchestration | Built for every moment of the call | Full agent platform (ASR, LLM, TTS, turn-taking) |
| IVR Navigation | Built-in DTMF. Navigates IVR menus at transfer destinations. | Built-in DTMF tool on Twilio and SIP trunk calls |
| Mid-Call Topic Switching | Flex Mode keeps context across tasks | LLM-driven. Workflows and Procedures for branching. |
| Contact Memory | Built in. A brief on each contact from past calls and SMS, shared across agents | No built-in memory documented. Returning-caller context comes from your own systems through a webhook. |
| Deployment Reliability | Optimized for 100M+ calls/month | Built for telephony scale (SIP, batch, burst concurrency) |
| Reusable Flow Components | Library Subflows: edit once and every agent that uses it updates | Tools and knowledge base shared across agents. Prompts and procedures are per agent. |
| Task Execution | Built-in task execution inside call | Tools and function calling |
| Agentic Warm Transfer | Whisper message, three-way intro, transfer agent and hold music, on Retell and imported numbers | Conference transfer. The operator message works on native Twilio numbers only. |
| Custom Telephony | Native SIP, inbound and outbound calls | Native SIP and Twilio, plus Vonage, Telnyx, Plivo and Exotel |
| Branded Calls | Supported for U.S. numbers on T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon | Not an ElevenLabs product. Set up caller name display with your carrier. |
| SMS Function | Supported | Supported through the native Twilio integration |
| AI Agent Builder | Conductor builds agents from a description, writes simulation tests and proposes changes for approval | Architect (Alpha) builds agents, writes simulations and proposes changes as versioned drafts |
| AI Quality Assurance | AI QA scores production calls automatically, and Conductor summarizes cohorts. Simulation testing included. | Agent tests in the dashboard and API, plus plain-language evaluations scored on every conversation |
| AI Observability | Conductor in Call History, Analytics and AI QA finds shared causes in failed calls, explains metric changes and summarizes QA cohorts | Spotlight shows topics, sentiment and success rate, and alerts on metric shifts with recommended next steps |
| Hold Music During Transfers | Custom audio (MP3, WAV and other formats, under 210 seconds) | Not documented for transfers. Custom hold audio for inbound callers queued at the concurrency limit (since Sep 2026). |
| CCaaS Integrations | Setup guides for Five9, Genesys Cloud, Amazon Connect, Avaya, NICE CXone, Talkdesk and LiveVox | Five9, Genesys, Amazon Connect (limited availability) |
| Voice & Audio Quality | Excellent. ElevenLabs voices available. | Excellent |
| Custom LLM Integration | Supported | Supported |
| Analytics & Monitoring | Call performance dashboards | Real-time analytics dashboard and configurable evals |
| Deployment Model | FDEs build the first agents with your team and train your internal deployed engineers to run them | FDE services build and launch, then transfer best practices and stay engaged |
| Pricing | | |
|---|---|---|
| Voice AI | From $0.07 a minute, including LLM and voice. Price depends on the LLM and voice you choose. | $0.08 a minute. LLM billed by usage. Burst minutes $0.16. |
| Telephony | $0.015 a minute on Retell numbers. $0 on your own SIP trunk. | At cost from your provider |
| Phone Number | $2.00/month | Through Twilio or your SIP provider |
| Toll Phone Number | $5.00/month | Through your telephony provider |
| Verified Phone Number | $10/month + $10 one-time setup | Not offered as an ElevenLabs product |
| Branded Calls | $0.10 per outbound call | Not offered as an ElevenLabs product. Set up caller name display with your carrier. |
| Batch Calls | $0.005 per dial | Supported. No per-dial fee listed. |
| Knowledge Base | 10 knowledge bases free, then $8/month for each additional knowledge base, plus $0.005 a minute in use | Has a size cap by plan: 1 MB (Free) to 1 GB (Business), higher on Enterprise |
| Concurrency | 20 free slots, then $8/month per extra concurrency slot; Enterprise limits start at 50 | By plan: 4 (Free) to 40 (Business), higher on Enterprise. Burst to 3x. |
| Contact Memory | $0.005 per memory update | ElevenLabs does not have cross-call memory out of the box. |
| Speech-to-Text | Included at no extra cost | Included at no extra cost |
| Enterprise-Grade | | |
|---|---|---|
| Compliance | HIPAA, SOC 2 Type 1 & 2, GDPR, ISO 27001 | HIPAA, SOC 2 Type 1 & 2, GDPR, ISO 27001 |
| Rate Limit | Enterprise tier starts at 50 concurrent calls | Concurrency cap by plan. Optional per-agent daily limit you set. |
| Uptime to date | >99.9% | 99.99% |
| Onboarding | Conductor builds agents from a description. FDEs train your team on enterprise rollouts. | No-code dashboard, Architect (Alpha), CLI, API and 50+ templates |
| PII Redaction | Automatic (names, addresses, DOBs, passwords, PINs) | Supported (HIPAA Zero-Retention mode) |
| Role-Based Access Control | Supported | Supported (RBAC + SSO on enterprise) |
Built for Contact Centers, Not Demos
Retell is the AI Voice Platform Enterprise Contact Centers Run On
Retell lets you build, test and deploy AI phone agents that handle real call volume, so your team spends its time on the conversations that need a person.
Contact Center Features Side by Side
A voice AI platform your contact center can run itself.
AI Quality Assurance
Retell ships a dedicated AI Quality Assurance layer that reviews calls automatically, scores performance, and shows patterns across your whole operation. Conductor can summarize any QA cohort with ranked findings and suggested next steps. ElevenLabs offers agent testing, plain-language evaluations and Spotlight, which groups conversations by topic and flags shifts in key metrics.
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Simulation Testing
Retell lets you simulate thousands of call scenarios before going live, so you can stress-test flows and catch edge cases at scale. Simulation testing is included in Retell at no extra cost. ElevenLabs also offers simulation, scenario and tool-call tests in its dashboard and API.
Post-Call Analysis
Retell captures outcomes, objections, drop-off points, and conversion data from every call and turns volume into operational insight. When a metric changes, you can ask Conductor why, and it will explain the change and propose a chart for your dashboard. ElevenLabs provides conversation analysis and a real-time analytics dashboard.
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Branded Calls & Verified Numbers
Retell displays your verified business name on caller ID. ElevenLabs doesn't sell branded calling. Its customers set up caller name displays with their carrier.
SMS Within the Call Flow
Retell sends SMS natively within the call flow, such as confirmations, follow-ups and links, without a third-party integration. ElevenLabs supports SMS through its native Twilio integration.
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Provider Flexibility
Retell orchestrates across your choice of LLM, TTS, STT, and telephony layer. That choice includes ElevenLabs voices. ElevenLabs supports custom LLM integration but is more vertically integrated around its own voice stack.
Agent Experience
Retell is built for the full complexity of real contact center operations, with 3-way warm transfers, whisper messages, and approval workflows before every handoff.
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When to Use Each Tool
Use ElevenLabs when you:
- Need voice synthesis for content, consumer apps or enterprise agents
- 90+ languages (Eleven v4 Turbo)
- Want to build a voice AI startup
- Are building conversational voice agents on its integrated stack
- Prefer a vertically integrated platform built around in-house voices
ElevenLabs is a solid choice when voice quality and an integrated voice stack matter.
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Use Retell when you:
- Run inbound support, outbound sales or IVR deflection with your choice of LLM and voice, ElevenLabs voices included
- Want your own internal deployed engineers to own and improve the agents after launch
- Need agents that remember returning callers across calls and SMS
- Manage many agents and want one script change to reach all of them
- Need briefed warm transfers on SIP trunk or imported numbers
- Run Avaya, NICE CXone, Talkdesk or LiveVox and want a published setup guide
Retell excels when your contact center wants full control over its voice AI.
FAQ
Common Questions
What is an AI voice agent?
An AI voice agent is an autonomous system that can listen, speak, and hold natural phone conversations like a human. It uses speech recognition, large language models, and text-to-speech technology to understand callers, respond intelligently, maintain context, and take actions such as booking appointments or updating systems without relying on rigid scripts or human intervention.
How do Retell AI voice agents work?
Retell AI is a real-time conversational AI platform that uses proprietary voice AI orchestration with low-latency speech recognition, LLM-powered conversation understanding, and real-time function calling. The platform features a ~600ms latency (industry-leading responsiveness), ultra-realistic voices built from real performance data, and proprietary turn-taking models that know when to speak and listen.
How do I create an AI voice agent with Retell AI?
Creating a voice AI agent with Retell is easy! Sign up for a free account on the Retell dashboard, where you’ll receive $10 of free usage. From there, you can customize and configure your AI voice agent, integrating it seamlessly with your company’s data and workflows
Can I connect an agent to my existing phone number?
Yes. Retell supports integration with any telephony system through SIP trunking, making it easy to connect your existing phone number and deploy your AI-powered answering service or AI IVR without changing infrastructure.
What is an AI contact center powered by Retell AI?
An AI contact center built on Retell AI is a next-generation voice automation platform that deploys LLM-based, humanlike voice agents to handle inbound and outbound calls at scale. These agents can function as AI receptionists , intelligent IVR systems, and outbound AI telemarketing agents while managing phone-based interactions with natural, human-quality conversations and autonomous task execution.
Can our own team run Retell agents after launch?
Yes. Retell's FDEs build your first agents alongside your team and train your people as they go. Your own internal deployed engineers then take on more of the work, with Conductor, AI QA and simulation testing to find and test fixes.
Revolutionize your call operation with Retell
