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How much does audio description cost?
In short: AI audio description costs roughly $0.50 to $2 per finished minute of video, and human or human-reviewed description costs roughly $7.50 to $16 or more per minute. Extended description often costs more per minute than standard description.
Typical price ranges
| Type of service | Typical price per minute |
|---|---|
| Automated AI description | about $0.50 to $2 |
| AI with human review | about $8 to $12 |
| Human-written description | about $7.50 to $16 or more |
Extended description is often charged at a higher rate than standard. Seen Aloud plans work out to $0.46 to $0.73 per minute, with extended description at the same rate; see pricing.
What drives the price
- Who writes the script. A trained describer watching every second costs far more than an automated pipeline. Human review on top of AI sits in between.
- Standard or extended. Extended description pauses the video to make room, which takes more editing. Many vendors charge it at a higher rate.
- Turnaround. Human services often quote days; rush delivery costs extra. Automated tools usually finish in minutes.
- Deliverables. A mixed MP4, a separate audio track, a WebVTT text track and an editable script may be priced separately or included.
- Volume. Large libraries are usually quoted on annual contracts with lower per-minute rates.
What a video library costs to describe
Multiply your total minutes by the per-minute rate. For a library of 100 hours (6,000 minutes):
| Rate per minute | Total |
|---|---|
| $0.55 (AI subscription) | $3,300 |
| $2.00 (AI, higher tier) | $12,000 |
| $7.50 (human, standard) | $45,000 |
| $12.00 (human, extended) | $72,000 |
This is why many institutions use AI description for the backlog and reserve human description for their most visible or most complex videos.
Is cheaper description good enough?
WCAG asks that description conveys the visual information needed to understand the content (W3C WAI). Whatever you pay, check that the script reads on-screen text and numbers correctly, does not talk over the narration, and is delivered in a format your platform can publish. AI can misidentify things, so keep the script and review high-stakes videos before publishing.
How to keep costs down
- Caption everything first; captions are required too and cost less.
- Skip videos with no essential visual information, such as a person talking to camera, and document why.
- Ask presenters to say on-screen text out loud in new recordings, so less description is needed.
- Describe new videos as you publish them, and work through the backlog by audience and traffic.