Hatsune Miku

Hatsune Miku
Developer(s)Crypton Future Media
Initial releaseAugust 31, 2007
Stable release
Hatsune Miku NT V2 (New Type Version 2) / March 18, 2025
Operating systemMicrosoft Windows, macOS
PlatformPC
Available in
  • Japanese
  • English
  • Chinese
TypeVocal synthesizer application
LicenseProprietary (Vocaloid voice/software)
Creative Commons BY-NC (character design)
Websiteec.crypton.co.jp/pages/prod/vocaloid/cv01_us

Hatsune Miku (Japanese: 初音ミク, [hatsɯne miꜜkɯ]), officially code-named CV01, is a Vocaloid software voicebank developed by Crypton Future Media. Its official mascot is depicted as a sixteen-year-old girl with long, turquoise twintails. Miku's personification has been marketed as a virtual idol, and has performed at live virtual concerts onstage as an animated holographic projection (rear-cast projection on a specially coated glass screen).

Miku uses Yamaha Corporation's Vocaloid 2, Vocaloid 3, and Vocaloid 4 singing synthesizing technologies, alongside Crypton Future Media's Piapro Studio, a standalone singing synthesizer editor. She was the second Vocaloid sold using the Vocaloid 2 engine and the first Japanese Vocaloid to use the Japanese version of the 2 engine. The voice is modeled from Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita.

The name of the character comes from merging the Japanese words for first (, hatsu), sound (, ne), and future (ミク, miku), thus meaning "the first sound of the future", which, along with her code name, refers to her position as the first of Crypton's "Character Vocal Series" (abbreviated "CV Series"), preceding Kagamine Rin/Len (code-named CV02) and Megurine Luka (code-named CV03). The number 01 can be seen on her left shoulder in official artwork.