How Does the Fox Singing Competition Show 'I Can See Your Voice' Work?

The latest musical competition show to make its way to Fox is I Can See Your Voice. After two seasons, it has quickly become one of the most-watched musical game shows on the network and is one of the few unscripted reality series that are filmed without a live audience. Ken Jeong serves as the show's host, which features celebrities, secret singers, and a contestant who has to guess the singers' abilities.

The contestant's goal is to eliminate all the bad singers in hopes that the one singer still standing is the good one. For every lousy singer that is eliminated, the contestant will win 15,000. Much like The Masked Singer, I Can See Your Voice has various facets apart from the musical aspect of the show. What we mean is that it's not just another singing competition show, like American Idol or The Voice.

Even though the format and the rules of the series are pretty simple to follow once you've tuned in, it can be hard to follow at first because there are quite a few moving parts. If you're wondering about the rules and the set-up of the show, we've got you covered.

On the series, Ken is joined by a rotating panel of celebrity detectives who are there to try and help one contestant decipher between the skilled vocalists from the tone-deaf singers, all without ever hearing them sing one note. After each round, the contestant will pick who they think is the lousy singer based on clues given in each round, including the lip-sync challenges and a Q&A. Another rule is that the number of good and bad singers is unknown to everyone, including those watching at home.

In the beginning, the six mystery singers are introduced to the contestant and the celebrity panel. One of the most essential rules on I Can See Your Voice is that everything that the good singer tells the panel must be true, while the bad singers are allowed to lie about their musical talent. After every round, a singer is eliminated and must take the stage of truth and uncover their voice, confirming whether the contestant made the right choice.

In the first round, each singer takes the stage to lip-sync their heart out as they try to throw off the contestant's guess. The talented singers will lip-sync to their own voices, and the terrible ones will use someone else’s.

In Season 2, the contestant now gets additional help outside of his five panelists — this new addition is called the golden mic lifeline. A mystery celebrity is secretly watching and listening to the singers. When called upon, they will give their advice on a particular singer that the contestant is having trouble figuring out. The rule with the golden mic is that it can only be used during the lip-syncing rounds.

The second round is called "Unlock My Life." In this round, the contestant can pick two mystery singers that they're particularly suspicious about and watch a profile video, loaded with photos, hints, and an interview. However, as we mentioned before, if the singer is one of the bad ones, those clues could be completely false. At the end of this round, the contestant must eliminate another singer who they believe is faking it.

If the contestant chooses to pursue the "Home Truths" aspect of the game, then round four takes us to the homes of each of the singers for some deeper digging. This optional round gives the contestant and panelists the opportunity to get a closer look at the home lives of each of the mystery singers through self-shot videos — but the catch is that, at the end of the round, the contestant must eliminate two singers.

The fifth round is Q&A time, in which the contestant can pick one of the two remaining singers and have 30 seconds to ask them anything about their musical background. From there, they will eliminate whoever they think is the worst singer. In the end, the rule is that the participant will have to choose whether they want to walk away with the money they've won so far, or risk it all on the notion that the remaining singer is a good one.

The last singer then performs a duet with the musical guests, and if the opponent's bet pays off, they will walk away with a whopping cash prize of $100,000. If the singer sucks, the contestant goes home with no money at all.

Think you can keep up? Tune in to I Can See Your Voice and find out if you can weed out the good and bad singers.

I Can See Your Voice airs on Wednesday nights at 8 p.m. EST on Fox.