Making Voiceovers for Shorts Without a Mic or a Script Read

A short needs a voice that doesn't sound like a robot reading a teleprompter. I write the script as spoken lines, not paragraphs, then let ElevenLabs narrate and I fix only the sentence it stumbled on.

The first pass is always too long. Shorts live or die in the first two seconds, so I cut the intro and lead with the payoff, then ask the model to read it like it's telling a friend, not announcing.

Voice choice matters more than people admit. I pick one that matches the tone and nudge the stability slider up so it doesn't emote weirdly on a calm explainer. The defaults are fine, the edges are better.

Export at a sensible bitrate and drop it under the video. The clip does the grabbing; the voice does the keeping. Don't let the tool write your hook, write that yourself.