OpenAI is giving paying users of ChatGPT a more natural way to interact with the AI by rolling out Advanced Voice Mode (AVM) to Plus and Teams subscribers, with Enterprise and Edu users getting access next week.
What’s New?
- A Smoother Voice Experience: AVM boasts improved speech recognition and smoother conversation flow, addressing some of the glitches reported in earlier tests.
- More Voices to Choose From: Five new nature-inspired voices (Arbor, Maple, Sol, Spruce, and Vale) join the existing cast (Breeze, Juniper, Cove, and Ember).
- Custom Instructions and Memory: Personalize how ChatGPT responds and have it remember past conversations for reference.
- A New Look: Gone are the black dots, replaced by a sleek blue animated sphere to represent AVM.
As part of the rollout, AVM is getting a revamped design. The feature is now represented by a blue animated sphere, instead of the animated black dots that OpenAI presented during its showcase of the technology in May.
Users will receive a pop-up in the ChatGPT app, next to the voice icon, when AVM has been made available to them.
ChatGPT is also getting five new voices that users can try out: Arbor, Maple, Sol, Spruce, and Vale. This brings ChatGPT’s total number of voices to nine (almost as many as Google’s Gemini Live), alongside Breeze, Juniper, Cove, and Ember. You might notice all of these names are inspired by nature, which could be because the whole point of AVM is to make using ChatGPT feel more natural.
What’s Missing (for Now)
- The “Sky” Voice: Legal issues arose due to its resemblance to actress Scarlett Johansson’s voice.
- Video and Screen Sharing: This feature, showcased earlier, allowing real-time interaction with visual information, is still under development.
Limited Availability
Currently, AVM is unavailable in the EU, UK, Switzerland, Iceland, Norway, and Liechtenstein due to stricter AI regulations in those regions.
Overall, this update brings a more natural and interactive experience to ChatGPT for paying users. It’ll be interesting to see how OpenAI addresses the missing features and expands AVM’s availability in the future.
