Some VPN services and travel apps legally license old Ivona voices. However, this is rare.
| Feature | Old Ivona Eric | "New" Eric (Neural) | | :--- | :--- | :--- | | Sound Quality | 22khz - 48khz (Slight metallic ring) | High Definition (Crystal clear, warm) | | Intonation | Chopped, sometimes abrupt stops | Smooth, flowing, natural breathing | | Pronunciation | Phonetic, needs manual tweaking | Context-aware AI processing | | Vibe | The "YouTuber" voice | The "Broadcaster/Pro" voice |
The “New Eric” is not a single voice but a category: Neural TTS (AWS Polly’s neural version of “Matthew” or other UK male voices, Microsoft Azure, ElevenLabs, or Google Wavenet). Some users call “New Eric” the updated Polly - Matthew (neural) or custom fine-tuned models.
| Feature | Old Ivona Eric | New Neural Eric (e.g., Polly Neural Matthew) |
|---------|----------------|------------------------------------------------|
| Naturalness | Very good (8/10) | Excellent (9.5/10) – breaths, micro-pauses |
| Emotion control | None | Tags for excited, whispered, conversational |
| Latency | Low (offline/online) | Very low (cloud neural) |
| Price | Free (old bundles) / Pay-as-you-go | Higher (neural tier ~$16/1M chars) |
| API/Integration | Legacy | Full SSML + real-time streaming |
Before cloud-based AI voices like Alexa or Siri became ubiquitous, Ivona was the gold standard. Founded in Poland, Ivona (pronounced "I-vona") created voices that were revolutionary for their time.
While most computer voices in the mid-2000s sounded like choking robots, Ivona’s voices—especially Eric, Brian (UK), and Amy—sounded surprisingly smooth. They had a slight robotic cadence, sure, but they were highly intelligible and packed with personality.
Why was "Old Eric" so popular?
Many offline TTS apps (e.g., Balabolka, TextAloud, older Screen readers) still include old Ivona voices. Users want to keep using those setups.