An AI voice assistant is an app you talk to out loud: it turns your speech into meaning, decides what to do, and answers in a spoken voice.
In plain words
There are two main designs. A chained pipeline runs three stages in order: speech recognition turns audio into text, a language model or agent works out the reply, and text-to-speech reads it aloud. You can inspect or swap each stage. A speech-to-speech design uses one model that listens and replies in audio directly, handling interruptions within one session. Either way, the wait before a useful spoken answer matters a lot.
A quick example
Imagine calling a restaurant's AI line to book a table. You speak, the assistant transcribes and understands the request, checks free slots with a booking tool, and replies out loud. If you cut in to change the time, it stops and adjusts.
Where you'll meet it
- Phone agents and customer service lines.
- Hands-free assistants in apps and devices.
Related
Sources
- DocsVoice agents, OpenAI API docs · read 29 Sept 2026
- Docspipecat, Pipecat (GitHub) · read 29 Sept 2026
Checked by WhatIsAI against the sources above · 29 Sept 2026. Spotted an error? Report it.