Animal sound effects
Real animals can be recorded. Imaginary ones can't, so generation is most useful for creatures that don't exist.
Listen: 10 samples from the animal collection
Every clip shows the exact prompt that produced it. The render script reads its prompts from the same file as this page. Copy one, change a word and generate your own.
Lion roar
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxlion roaring, deep guttural roar building to a full-throated bellow, open savannah, distant echo
Horse gallop
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxhorse galloping on packed dirt, rhythmic hoofbeats with snorting breath, outdoor, passing by
Cow moo
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxcow mooing in a field, long low call with a breathy tail, open countryside, distant birds
Rooster crow
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxrooster crowing at dawn, sharp piercing four-note call, farmyard with faint hens, outdoor
Snake
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxrattlesnake rattling and hissing a warning, dry buzzing rattle with a sharp exhale, close and dry
Elephant trumpet
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxelephant trumpeting, brassy rising blast with a rumbling low chest tail, open outdoor space
Seagulls
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxcolony of seagulls calling over a harbour, overlapping squawks with waves and rigging beneath
Frog chorus
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxchorus of frogs croaking around a pond at night, overlapping calls with insects, humid outdoor
Dog attack
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxlarge dog growling low then erupting into aggressive rapid barking, close and threatening, outdoor
Whale song
via audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfxhumpback whale song, long moaning glissandi with deep underwater resonance, vast submerged space
Prompts that work
These models respond to physical description. Name the material, the action and the space.
Dog bark
single large dog bark, deep and aggressive, close mic, dry, no room tone
"Large" sets the pitch register. Dog barks span two octaves by breed size, and size is the word that controls pitch.
Crow
single crow caw, harsh and raspy, outdoor open space, slight distance
"Harsh and raspy" separates a crow from a generic bird call. Most bird prompts default to something like a songbird unless you name the roughness.
Cat hiss
angry cat hiss followed by a low growl, close mic, sharp and defensive, dry
Two sounds in sequence (hiss, then growl) give the model an arc to render.
Wolf howl
single wolf howl, rising then sustained pitch, heard from a distance, faint echo, outdoor night
"Heard from a distance" adds the faint echo and softened high end that distance produces, as well as lowering the volume.
Invented creature
large imaginary creature growl, low guttural rumble with a wet throat texture, threatening, close mic, 2 seconds
"Wet throat texture" borrows a detail from real animal anatomy, so a creature that doesn't exist still sounds like it has a body.
Making animal sounds that fit
Size sets pitch
In almost every animal vocalization, body size maps to pitch and resonance. A large dog barks an octave lower than a small one; a big cat growls where a house cat hisses. Naming the size ("large", "small", "massive") often works better than adding species-specific adjectives, because size sets the register for any animal, real or invented.
Include distance and space
A wolf howl heard across a valley has echo and softer high frequencies than one heard close, and often implies an outdoor night setting. If the sound should feel far away, say so ("heard from a distance", "faint echo"). The model will not infer it from context.
Invented creatures still need real anatomy
A monster growl that doesn't map to any real physiology tends to come out as a generic low rumble. Borrow anatomical detail from real animals ("wet throat texture", "guttural", "chest resonance") and combine it with an impossible scale ("massive", "cavernous") to get something that sounds like it has a body. No sample library has a recording of an imaginary creature, so this is where generation helps most.
Why generate locally
The models run on your machine, which changes the cost, the privacy and what you can automate.
Offline after download
Weights are fetched once. After that, generation, the library and the API all work with the network off. Everything lives in one SQLite file and one folder of WAVs under ~/.soundbox, and nothing is uploaded.
Your agent can use it
Soundbox runs an MCP server in the same process, with tools for generating and listing sounds. Generated files come back as absolute paths, so an agent can copy them into a project.
Licences stated up front
Every model's terms are shown before you download it, and non-commercial weights need an explicit confirmation. Soundbox is MIT. The licence of the model that made a sound governs what you may do with it.
claude mcp add --transport http soundbox http://127.0.0.1:17494/mcpcurl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:17494/api/generate \
-H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
-d '{"model":"audiocpp-stable-audio-3-sfx","prompt":"8-bit coin pickup blip","duration_s":1}'Frequently asked questions
- Can I use these sounds in a commercial video or game?
- It depends on the model that made them. Soundbox shows each model's licence before you download its weights. The Stable Audio 3 models use the Stability AI Community License: commercial use is free below USD $1M annual revenue, and above that Stability requires an enterprise licence. ACE-Step 1.5 is MIT. MiniMax's models allow commercial use under a revenue cap and require an attribution notice. Some voice and stem-separation models are non-commercial only. Soundbox itself is MIT, but the audio is governed by the licence of the model that made it. Read that licence before you ship; this summary is not legal advice.
- Does this run offline?
- Yes, once the weights are downloaded. Soundbox runs the models locally and stores everything in one SQLite file and one folder of WAVs under ~/.soundbox. There is no account, API key or upload step. Only the initial model download needs the network.
- What hardware do I need?
- An NVIDIA GPU with 8 GB or more. CPU-only is supported, but each generation then takes minutes. That is fine for a few short clips and slow for a large batch.
- Can my coding agent generate these for me?
- Yes. While Soundbox is running it serves MCP at http://127.0.0.1:17494/mcp, with tools for generating and listing sounds. An agent can generate a sound as part of the task it is already doing and gets back an absolute file path to use in your project.
- How is this different from downloading a sample pack?
- A pack can give you a real dog bark or crow caw, but it has no recording of a creature that doesn't exist. Generating covers both: real animals at the size and distance your scene needs, and invented creatures built from real anatomical detail. It costs time and a GPU.