In ElevenLabs Agents, a text-only conversation (Chat Mode) is when an agent communicates purely via text—no audio input or output. It’s intended for chat interfaces, testing agents, or use cases where audio isn’t needed. (elevenlabs.io)
How it’s enabled:
Configure the agent for chat mode at creation, or enforce it at runtime via SDK/override settings to run conversations in text-only. No audio interface or microphone permissions are required; ensure you handle the agent_response event to display the agent’s text. (elevenlabs.io)
In the web widget, conversations that start with a text message begin in chat (text-only) mode; you can also enable text input to allow multimodal if desired. (elevenlabs.io)
Short answer: not categorically. ElevenLabs bills chat (text‑only) conversations per message, while “normal” voice conversations are billed per minute; which is cheaper depends on how many messages you send versus how long the call lasts.
Text‑only: $0.003–$0.004 per message (Creator/Pro/Scale/Business: $0.003; Free/Starter: $0.004). LLM costs are passed through separately. (help.elevenlabs.io)
Voice-only: charged per connection minute (with a 95% discount for >10s silence). LLM costs are passed through separately. (help.elevenlabs.io)
Multimodal: per-minute charges plus per‑message charges. (help.elevenlabs.io)
The documentation does not state that text‑only is always cheaper—pricing uses different units. (help.elevenlabs.io)
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