The Voice is a multinational singing competition television franchise. The series started in the Netherlands as The Voice of Holland in 2010. Many other countries have adapted the format and began airing their national versions in 2011 and 2012. It has become a rival to Simon Fuller's Idol and Simon Cowell's The X Factor.
Contestants are aspiring singers drawn from public auditions. The show's format features three stages of competition. The first is the blind audition, in which four coaches listen to contenders without seeing them, and turn their chairs to signify that they are interested in working with that artist. If more than one coach turns the chair, the artist chooses the coach he or she would like to work with. The blind audition ends when each coach has a set number of artists to work with (such as ten in the U.K. version, twelve in the U.S. version or sixteen in the Dutch version). Coaches will dedicate themselves to developing their singers, giving them advice, and sharing the secrets of their success.
The competition then enters into a battle phase, when the coaches picks two of their own team members against each other to sing the same song together in front of a studio audience. After the vocal face-off, the coach must choose which singers will advance.
At the end of the battle episodes, the strongest members of each coach's roster proceed to the live stage shows. In this final performance phase of the competition, the top contestants from each team compete against each other during a live broadcast. The television audience vote to save one contestant on each team, leaving the coach to decide live who they want to save and who will not move on. In the next round, the public chooses between the two artists left on each team, and the coach also has a vote that weighs equally with the public vote.
Finally, each coach will have his/her best contestant left standing to compete in the finals, singing an original song. From these four, one will be named "The Voice" - and will receive the grand cash prize of a recording contract. Starting with the U.S. version, the coaches usually perform together in the first episode.
