# Kani-TTS-2 Offers New Open-Source Voice Generation

> An independent researcher has released a new English text-to-speech model under a permissive license, built on a modern generative foundation.

Published by The Open Weights on Feb 12, 2026. Canonical: https://theopenweights.com/news/kani-tts-2-english-4urg

## Key facts

- Company: nineninesix
- Model: Kani-TTS-2 (English)
- Version: 2
- Category: Text → Speech
- Modalities: Text → Speech
- License: Apache 2.0 (Open weights, commercial use allowed)
- Architecture: KaniTTS2ForCausalLM
- Precision: BF16
- Weights size: 0.7 GB
- Languages: English
- Significance: minor
- Published: 2026-02-12
- Last verified: 2026-06-17
- Hugging Face: https://huggingface.co/nineninesix/kani-tts-2-en
- Canonical URL: https://theopenweights.com/news/kani-tts-2-english-4urg

A new, permissively licensed text-to-speech (TTS) model called Kani-TTS-2 has been released by the independent researcher known as 'nineninesix'. The English-language model is now available for download and use on the Hugging Face Hub, providing another option for developers seeking open-source voice generation tools.

Technically, Kani-TTS-2 is built on a Latent Flow Matching 2 (LFM2) backbone. This positions the model within a modern class of generative techniques that aim for efficient and high-quality synthesis. While specific performance benchmarks were not provided with the release, its foundation suggests a contemporary approach to audio generation.

## Why It Matters

The release of Kani-TTS-2 contributes to a growing ecosystem of open audio models. With its Apache 2.0 license, developers can freely use, modify, and integrate the model into both research and commercial applications. This stands in contrast to the many proprietary, API-gated TTS services, offering greater flexibility and control for building voice-enabled products.

You can explore the model, listen to samples, and find implementation details in the official [Kani-TTS-2 repository](https://huggingface.co/nineninesix/kani-tts-2-en) on Hugging Face.

## Get the model

- [Hugging Face](https://huggingface.co/nineninesix/kani-tts-2-en)

## Sources

- [nineninesix/kani-tts-2-en](https://huggingface.co/nineninesix/kani-tts-2-en) — Hugging Face, Feb 12, 2026

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Source: The Open Weights (https://theopenweights.com/). Aggregated and written by Claude, curated by humans. Cite as: "Kani-TTS-2 Offers New Open-Source Voice Generation", The Open Weights, Feb 12, 2026, https://theopenweights.com/news/kani-tts-2-english-4urg