Speech Technology

Gain the expertise you need to contribute to cutting-edge practices in speech synthesis and speech recognition. Enroll in one of the few studies in Europe where you can study speech technology!

✔️ Connect with guest speakers from speech tech start-ups, multinationals, and research labs around the globe

✔️ Create your own speech tech demo as your final project

✔️ Turn your passion for tech into a meaningful contribution to society

Why choose this Master's programme?

Whenever you dictate a message on your smartphone, you are using voice technologies. But this is only the beginning! Soon, speech technologies will be present in the field of health, cybersecurity, language learning, and much more. For now, people with scientific expertise in the domain of Speech Tech are in short supply. We aim to fix that!

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Events:
24 - 28 March 2025: Master's Week
Join the online session and get a taste of this programme.

Facts & Figures

Degree: MSc in Voice Technology
Course type: Master
Duration: 12 months (60 ECTS)
Croho code: 60472
Language of instruction: English
Start: September
Faculty: Campus Fryslân

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Why study this programme in Leeuwarden?

Leeuwarden is a medium-sized vibrant student city and the capital of the province of Fryslân. This is a city of innovation, home to many start-ups and established companies, including established game and tech businesses which could collaborate on speech technology applications. The city hosts universities, colleges, research institutes, and language-related NGOs. Speech technology is even recognized by the province as a crucial domain of regional interest, indicating strong local support.

You should consider studying this programme because:

this is the only graduate programme dedicated to speech synthesis and speech recognition
it is interdisciplinary in nature and students from diverse backgrounds collaborate with each other and industrial partners
it offers the opportunity to develop speech recognizers, make synthetic voices, and execute empirical experiments
it creates space for you to showcase your expertise by making a demonstrator as your thesis project
it is located in Leeuwarden, a multilingual reality with locals speaking the Frisian language alongside Dutch, English and a number of others. It is, then, an interesting test-bed for speech technology developments involving less-resourced languages, multilingualism and code switching.

Programme

The curriculum is aligned across four blocks.

1: The courses in this block lay the foundations for the MSc. Speech Technology with essential content needed for the rest of the programme. This includes an introductory course into speech technology (in which you will develop your first application). Students also learn Python programming for speech technology and become familiar with the scientific study of speech sounds.

2: This block provides subject-specific courses on voice tech. The knowledge and skills learned in the 1st block are used together with Machine Learning within the courses Speech Recognition I and Speech Synthesis I, both of which start from the humble beginnings of voice technology, and give students an inside, hands-on view on some of the first attempts to automatically recognize and synthesize voice up to current systems.

3: Speech recognition and synthesis are taken to a higher level in Speech Recognition II and Speech Synthesis II as students learn about state-of-the art systems and real-world challenges, augmented with guest lectures given by industrial partners. The Thesis Design course educates students on experimental protocol and research ethics and guides them through the development of a pilot study and prototype demonstrator.

4: Students combine knowledge and skills from the previous blocks and use them in their Thesis Project. Building on the pilot study and prototype developed in the last block, students write their thesis and polish their prototype to create a demonstrator suitable for their thesis defense. They also prepare to present results at the end of the year.

	Semesters
CoursesCourse Catalog >	1a	1b	2a	2b
Introduction to Speech Technology (5 EC)
Programming (5 EC)
Speech Sounds (5 EC)
Machine Learning (5 EC)
Speech Recognition I (5 EC)
Speech Synthesis I (5 EC)
Speech Recognition II (5 EC)
Speech Synthesis II (5 EC)
Thesis Design (5 EC)
Thesis Project (15 EC)

Study abroad

Study abroad is unaccommodated

Entry requirements

Admission requirements

Specific requirements	More information
language test	Sufficient English language proficiency is required, except for native speakers of the English language from the following countries: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom. To prove your English language proficiency, you can provide one of the following documents: Full English Bachelor's degree,* where the only language of instruction is English; TOEFL: a minimum score of 90 with a minimum of 18 on reading and listening, 20 on speaking and 21 on writing; IELTS: a minimum score of 6.5 with a minimum score of 6.0 on all items; Cambridge: C1 advanced or C2 Proficiency with a minimum score of 180. English-taught bachelors from the following countries are valid as proof of English proficiency: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom. An exemption can be given by the Admission Board.

Specific requirements

More information

language test

Sufficient English language proficiency is required, except for native speakers of the English language from the following countries: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom.

To prove your English language proficiency, you can provide one of the following documents:

Full English Bachelor's degree,* where the only language of instruction is English;
TOEFL: a minimum score of 90 with a minimum of 18 on reading and listening, 20 on speaking and 21 on writing;
IELTS: a minimum score of 6.5 with a minimum score of 6.0 on all items;
Cambridge: C1 advanced or C2 Proficiency with a minimum score of 180.

English-taught bachelors from the following countries are valid as proof of English proficiency: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom.

An exemption can be given by the Admission Board.

Application deadlines

Type of student	Deadline	Start course
Dutch students	01 July 2025	01 September 2025
EU/EEA students	01 May 2025	01 September 2025
non-EU/EEA students	01 May 2025	01 September 2025

PLEASE NOTE: your application deadline is determined by the country where you obtained your diploma, not your nationality. For example: 'Dutch students' means students with a Dutch diploma; 'EU/EEA students' means students with a diploma from a EU/EEA country; 'non-EU/EEA students' means students with a diploma from a non-EU/EEA country.

Admission requirements

Specific requirements	More information
language test	Sufficient English language proficiency is required, except for native speakers of the English language from the following countries: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom. To prove your English language proficiency, you can provide one of the following documents: Full English Bachelor's degree,* where the only language of instruction is English; TOEFL: a minimum score of 90 with a minimum of 18 on reading and listening, 20 on speaking and 21 on writing; IELTS: a minimum score of 6.5 with a minimum score of 6.0 on all items; Cambridge: C1 advanced or C2 Proficiency with a minimum score of 180. English-taught bachelors from the following countries are valid as proof of English proficiency: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom. An exemption can be given by the Admission Board.

Specific requirements

More information

language test

Sufficient English language proficiency is required, except for native speakers of the English language from the following countries: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom.

To prove your English language proficiency, you can provide one of the following documents:

Full English Bachelor's degree,* where the only language of instruction is English;
TOEFL: a minimum score of 90 with a minimum of 18 on reading and listening, 20 on speaking and 21 on writing;
IELTS: a minimum score of 6.5 with a minimum score of 6.0 on all items;
Cambridge: C1 advanced or C2 Proficiency with a minimum score of 180.

English-taught bachelors from the following countries are valid as proof of English proficiency: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, United States, United Kingdom.

An exemption can be given by the Admission Board.

Language requirements

Exam	Minimum score
C1 Advanced (formerly CAE)	C1
C2 Proficiency (formerly CPE)	C2
IELTS overall band	6.5
IELTS listening	6
IELTS reading	6
IELTS writing	6
IELTS speaking	6
TOEFL internet based	90

Registration procedure

The MSc VT allows direct entry for anyone with a bachelor's degree from a recognized university and a sincere interest in the topic. That said, a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Artificial intelligence and Applied Linguistics (and familiarity with Python) would be an asset.

Application deadlines

Type of student	Deadline	Start course
Dutch students	01 July 2025	01 September 2025
EU/EEA students	01 May 2025	01 September 2025
non-EU/EEA students	01 May 2025	01 September 2025

PLEASE NOTE: your application deadline is determined by the country where you obtained your diploma, not your nationality. For example: 'Dutch students' means students with a Dutch diploma; 'EU/EEA students' means students with a diploma from a EU/EEA country; 'non-EU/EEA students' means students with a diploma from a non-EU/EEA country.

Tuition fees

Nationality	Year	Fee	Programme form
EU/EEA	2024-2025	€ 2530	full-time
non-EU/EEA	2024-2025	€ 20800	full-time

Practical information for:

Dutch students International students

After your studies

The MSc. in Voice Technology prepares you for a meaningful career in the industry of speech technology. The combination of programming and machine learning skills with linguistics knowledge is a very attractive feature for the labor market. The skills you acquire throughout this master's will enable to work in speech labs of the bigger tech companies, both in Europe and beyond. If you wish, you can also choose for an academic career.

Job prospects

Throughout the programme we invite several guest speakers from industry. That way students will get a good impression of the various possibilities ranging from developing speech recognizer, synthetic voices, automatic detection of pathologies from speech, the use of speech technology in robotica and/or dialogue systems, etc. The speech technology industry is a fast-growing market which provides lots of opportunities for graduates.

Job examples

Voice Forensic Specialist
Speech Analyst
Research Engineer
Entrepreneur
PhD Researcher
Speech Scientist

Research

The MSc. Voice Technology is embodied in the “Culture, Language and Technology” research department. Which consists of an international, multidisciplinary team of PhD's and postdoctoral researchers working on topics as diverse as voice-based disease recognition, multilingualism and the brain, voice synthesis for under-resourced languages, multilingual ethnography, and more.

Some of these young scholars may make a guest appearance in your lectures and provide opportunities to connect to doctoral research projects, co-authored publications, or one of our multiple EU-subsidized research grants.

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Dutch diploma International diploma

Dutch brochure English brochure

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Contact

Marijke Huisman-Wolters (General inquiries Voice Technology programme & application)
Email: cf-vt rug.nl
Telephone: +31 (0)6 31 98 24 13

During my master's studies, I mastered the fundamental theories and practices of deep learning, speech recognition, and speech synthesis. Given the rapid advancement of deep learning, staying updated on state-of-the-art approaches is a lifelong skill.
– Tatsu Matsushima

This is one of the few places in Europe where you can study speech technology.
– Maria Tepei

In Leeuwarden, I really had the time to focus on myself and my experience, and how I can contribute to the community while also studying and having a great student life.
– Chiara about Leeuwarden

Study associations

Nobis Cura Futuri

Nobis Cura Futuri is the Study Association and the official embodiment of the international student community at Campus Fryslân.

Founded in 2020, we aim to provide plenty of fun, social and academic events (think of Pub crawls, talent shows, travels, guest-speaker evenings). All in the spirit of Nobis Cura Futuri: “The Care of the Future is Ours”, meaning we strive to provide activities that are aimed at making the most of your student life by adhering to our values of responsibility, diversity, sustainability and development.

https://www.rug.nl/cf/studeren-bij-cf/nobis-cura-futuri

Speech Technology

Why choose this Master's programme?

Study abroad

Admission requirements

Application deadlines

Admission requirements

Language requirements

Registration procedure

Application deadlines

Job prospects

Job examples

Research

Contact

Study associations

Nobis Cura Futuri

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