Reduce round-trip time for voice AI in Europe

Every millisecond counts when you’re building natural, real-time conversations with voice AI. When round trip time exceeds 300 milliseconds, human-to-AI interactions start to feel sluggish, robotic, and frustrating.

The biggest driver of these delays in Europe is the lack of local AI infrastructure. Many platforms still process conversational data, including transcription, LLM inference, and text-to-speech on servers located in the United States. That extra distance introduces unnecessary latency, compliance risk, and deployment complexity.

At Telnyx, we’re solving the problem by deploying infrastructure on the ground. Our new AI infrastructure in Paris results in sub-200ms round-trip tune for Telnyx-powered Voice AI Agents. The result? More natural, fast, responsive AI-powered conversations that meet strict data residency laws like GDPR and DORA.

Here we’ll talk about why having infrastructure in Europe makes a big difference for round-trip time, and why that really matters for the future of voice AI in the region.

Why round-trip time matters for voice AI

Round-trip time (RTT) is the total time required for data to travel from a source to its destination and back. In this case, it’s the delay between when a user speaks and when the AI responds. In voice interactions, it determines how “real” a conversation feels.

The threshold for human-like responsiveness is low. Round-trip time above 300ms disrupts the natural flow of dialogue. This means every hop through multiple cloud regions, providers, or APIs risks degrading the user experience. For voice AI to replace live agents or drive customer engagement, platforms need to deliver responses in real time. Anything above the 300 millisecond threshold can feel jarring or artificial, especially in fast-paced use cases like support calls or reservations.

US-based infrastructure inflates round-trip time for EU-based voice AI

European users that interact with AI agents powered by US-based infrastructure often deal with high round-trip time. Speech and media traffic must travel thousands of miles between a European user and a US-based server. Even with fast networks, the physical distance adds up and pushes round trip time past the 300 millisecond mark.

How to reduce round-trip time in Europe

While there are multiple factors that contribute to round-trip time, the physical distance between the caller and infrastructure is the main issue. By deploying in-region infrastructure, AI agent platforms can dramatically reduce the distance traveled by data, reducing round-trip time and having the added benefit of keeping data in-region.

In-region AI processing for reduced round-trip time

Running inference, transcription, and text-to-speech pipelines on GPUs physically located in Europe, eliminates the need for cross-continental data transfers. When a call is answered, voice packets are processed on the continent rather than waiting for answers from distant cloud regions.

This local access to AI compute enables dramatically faster decision-making, tighter turn-taking, and more fluid dialogue between caller and AI agent. Round trip time drops, and user satisfaction climbs.

Why this matters:

• Sub-200ms round trip time for users across the continent, by removing transatlantic travel.
• Enables human-like responsiveness, even for complex agent logic.

Media anchoring near your users

Anchoring media streams close to users also aids in avoiding unnecessary latency. Providers that have the infrastructure to route call audio through Anchorsites in Europe can remove even more lag from the AI agent interaction. When paired with a privately owned global IP network, this approach ensures media takes the most direct, congestion-free path, delivering consistent, low-latency performance across the continent.

Why this matters:

• Reduce latency by keeping calls in the EU.
• Improved call quality by avoiding the congested public internet.
• Greater reliability and consistency by keeping all media traffic on a privately owned global IP network.

Stay compliant with data privacy regulations

Add a paragraph here about GDPR and DORA and how keeping call and data in-region ensures compliance for companies dealing with EU citizen data. For enterprises that require explicit regional boundaries, media streams can be pegged to EU-only anchor sites with a single toggle.

Why this matters:

• Keeps sensitive data in-region for easier GDPR and DORA compliance.
• Strengthens customer trust by demonstrating a proactive commitment to privacy and security.
• Reduces legal and financial risk by ensuring operations meet stringent regulatory requirements.

Telnyx delivers sub-200ms round-trip time, powered by EU AI infrastructure

Our new GPU Point of Presence (PoP) in Paris was purpose-built to support low-latency voice AI interactions across Europe. By colocating AI compute with telephony infrastructure, and routing calls over our private IP network, Telnyx ensures sub-200ms round trip-time and compliance with local regulations for users across Europe.

Reducing the physical distance

At Telnyx, we believe it shouldn't matter where you’re calling from. Every customer should have the same low-latency AI agent experience. For that, the lowest possible round-trip time is non-negotiable.

Our newly deployed AI infrastructure in Paris ensures that teams building Voice AI Agents with Telnyx in the EU give their customers equally fast responses as their US-counterparts.

By colocating compute, telephony, and media handling in-region, Telnyx eliminates the hidden tradeoffs of cloud-hopping architectures. The result? Voice AI that’s fast, future-proof, and frictionless.

Compliance without complexity

Beyond speed, regional infrastructure makes it dramatically easier to meet strict regulations in the EU. With GPUs and Paris and Media AnchorSites across Europe, call media and model inference data stay in-region. This satisfies residency requirements without needing external compliance layers. Additionally, by owning and operating the full pipeline, Telnyx reduces the number of vendors handling sensitive data, simplifying audits and reducing risk.

One provider, one stack

Most platforms rely on multiple vendors for their telephony carrier, AI inference, global cloud, text-to-speech, and transcription. Telnyx is different. We own and operate every layer of the voice AI stack from SIP and phone numbers to GPU-backed inference and real-time audio transport.

This vertical integration means fewer network hops and failure points, plus a dramatically faster response time. Telnyx’s global IP network, direct-to-carrier PSTN connections, DID ownership, and colocated AI compute work in tandem to deliver consistently low round trip time without vendor overhead or unpredictable latency.

This full-stack advantage powers:

• Faster call setup and response time across all endpoints.
• Lower cost per minute by cutting out cloud and carrier middlemen.
• Seamless AI voice experiences with unmatched reliability, speed, and control.

When every component is purpose-built to work together, the performance benefits multiply. The result is voice AI that is faster, more predictable, secure, and scalable, ready for enterprise-grade deployments across Europe.