VO Business Answers · Rates & money
How much should I charge for voiceover work?
Price voiceover from two parts: a session fee for your time and talent, plus a usage fee for where and how long the recording runs. Consult the GVAA Rate Guide and, for union work, SAG-AFTRA scale as baselines — then adjust for market, media, territory, and term. Never quote a single number before you know the usage.
Why there's no single rate
The same 30-second read is worth very different money as a local radio spot, a national TV campaign, or a perpetual web buyout. What you're selling isn't minutes of audio — it's the right to use your voice in a specific place for a specific time. That's why professional rates are quoted as session + usage, not as a flat number.
Before quoting, get four facts: the media (TV, radio, web, internal), the market (local, regional, national), the territory, and the term (13 weeks, 1 year, perpetuity). A client who can't answer those isn't ready for a quote yet.
Where the baselines live
The GVAA Rate Guide is the most widely referenced non-union baseline in the industry, organized by genre and usage. Union jobs follow SAG-AFTRA's published scale. NAVA (the National Association of Voice Actors) publishes business guidance and benchmarks for working professionals. Quote from a baseline, then adjust for your experience and the client's scope.
VOpilot tracks the usage terms on every job — media, territory, term, and expiry — so renewals become invoices instead of forgotten money. Its rate context is informed by a benchmarks partnership with NAVA.
Sources: GVAA Rate Guide · SAG-AFTRA contracts · NAVA
By Jack Daniel — working voiceover artist; founder, VOpilot. Updated 2026-07-24.
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