Midjourney Pricing Explained: Costs, Subscriptions & Refunds
Midjourney is a revolutionary AI platform that is well-known for its capability to generate AI images offers a range of subscription plans designed to meet different needs and budgets.
With monthly fees ranging from $10 to $60 and yearly commitments offering a 20% discount, Midjourney ensures that engaging with AI-powered creativity is accessible to everyone.
For those undecided, a free trial that includes 25 image generations provides a low-risk opportunity to test the service.
In this article, we will provide you with an in-depth understanding of Midjourney’s pricing, breakdown of subscription costs, benefits of each plan and further details essential for prospective subscribers.
Join us as we navigate the path of Midjourney’s different subscriptions.
Midjourney Pricing Plans
Midjourney offers a diverse array of subscription plans each designed to meet specific user requirements, providing flexibility in pricing and feature sets.
These plans range from a free trial to a more extensive Pro Plan, catering to different usage intensities and necessities.
The Free Trial (goes on and off) offering 0.4 hours of Fast GPU Time for a lifetime is ideal for those wishing to explore the platform without any financial commitment. It however lacks additional features offered in paid plans.
The Basic Plan is priced at $10 monthly or $8 monthly with a yearly commitment, provides 3.3 hours of Fast GPU Time per month. Users also have the option to purchase extra GPU time at $4 per hour. This plan is suitable for casual users, permits solo work in direct messages and enables users to earn free GPU Time by rating images.
- Cost: $10/month or $8/month with yearly plan
- Fast GPU hours: 200 minutes/month
- Relaxed GPU hours: Not Available
- Usage rights: General Commercial Terms
- Jobs: 3 concurrent jobs and 10 jobs in the queue
- Private Generations: Not available (images will be public at all times).
The Standard Plan costs $30 monthly or $24 monthly with an annual commitment. This plan offers 15 hours of Fast GPU Time per month and unlimited Relax GPU Time. This package is recommended for most users as it provides approximately 1000 actions. Once the Fast GPU Time is exhausted, users have the option to switch to “relax” mode for infinite image generation.
- Cost: $30/month or $24/month with yearly plan
- Fast GPU hours: 15 hours/month
- Relaxed GPU hours: Unlimited
- Usage rights: General Commercial Terms
- Jobs: 3 concurrent jobs and 10 jobs in the queue
- Private Generations: Not available (images will be publicly visible at all times).
The Pro Plan, launched in mid-December 2022 due to high demand, costs $60 monthly or $48 monthly with a yearly commitment. This plan offers 30 hours of Fast GPU Time and unlimited Relax GPU Time per month. The Pro Plan allows for 12 concurrent Fast Jobs and three concurrent Relaxed Jobs and incorporates all features of the Standard Plan. With this plan you will get Stealth Mode that is recommended for users who wish to keep their image creations private.
- Cost: $60/month or $48/month with yearly plan
- Fast GPU Hours: 30 hours/month
- Relaxed GPU hours: Unlimited
- Usage rights: General Commercial Terms
- Jobs: 12 concurrent Fast jobs, 3 concurrent Relaxed Jobs and 10 jobs in the queue
- Private Generations: Yes are available via Stealth mode.
Overall, each Midjourney subscription plan offers general commercial usage rights (except free trial), access to the Midjourney member gallery and official Discord enabling users to select a plan that best fits with their needs.
The Basic Plan will suffice for most users as it offers enough credits for experimentation.
Current image pricing comes down to 3 to 5 cents, 6 to 10 cents for for high-quality images. Relax hours in Standard and Pro plans can significantly reduce this cost.
Midjourney’s paid plans offer unlimited image generation through relax mode, providing cost-effective access to the platform.
Users can queue prompts, optimizing resource usage. Compared to alternatives like Dall-E, Midjourney’s cost per image is lower.
Important Points about Midjourney Subscription
Manage Midjourney Subscription
You can easily manage your subscription plan by visiting https://www.midjourney.com/account/.
Yearly Subscription Savings
Midjourney offers a 20% discount for annual subscriptions. Pricing is as follows: Basic Plan at $8/month, Standard Plan at $24/month, and Pro Plan at $48/month.
Refunds
Subscribers qualify for refunds if they’ve used less than 1% of their monthly GPU minutes. Eligible users will see a dialog box for a refund when initiating account cancellation.
Buying more fast hours
Should users exhaust their Fast GPU time within a billing month, extra Fast GPU hours can be purchased at $4/hr.
These hours don’t expire but require an active subscription to be used. The purchase can be made through the Midjourney account page.
Switching plans
Users can switch plans anytime. For upgrades, users can choose instant activation or wait till the end of the billing cycle, with prorated pricing offered for instant upgrades.
Downgrades take effect at the cycle end, and unused Fast GPU Time is credited if users opt for immediate upgrades.
Monthly Renewals
Unused monthly Fast GPU time doesn’t roll over. Fast mode is auto-reactivated upon subscription renewal. Subscription management is via https://www.midjourney.com/account/.
Cancellations
Subscriptions can be canceled anytime via https://www.midjourney.com/account/.
Cancellations take effect after the current billing cycle, and subscription perks like community gallery access persist until the cycle ends.
Generated images remain intact after subscription cancellation.
Is the Midjourney Cost Worth It?
Yes – Plans starting at $8/month offers significant value for both casual and professional use.
It provides high-quality, customizable images without needing complex prompts or model training.
The paid plans offer unlimited access to image generation, allowing anything within imagination, except NSFW content.
A cost-effective alternative to Shutterstock, Midjourney allows more control over outputs.
The platform is found to be more efficient than searching for royalty-free images online.
Midjourney’s accessibility and ease of use make it worth the investment. Try the free trial and upgrade based on usage.
Midjourney Alternatives
Midjourney provides quality AI-generated images, albeit at a significant cost. It necessitates careful management of allocated hours, even on paid plans. Fortunately, there are alternatives:
- Stable Diffusion Online: A free option with a simpler interface. It uses the Stable Diffusion model but offers no adjustable settings or styles.
- DreamStudio: Works through a comprehensive website with various adjustable options. It uses the open-source Stable Diffusion model.
- Bing Image Creator: A free option due to Microsoft’s OpenAI partnership. It offers the DALL-E 2 image generator with 100 boost credits initially and unlimited slower generations later.
Other alternatives exist using Stable Diffusion models, which are free and publicly available.
While they may initially be less polished than Midjourney, various open-source projects are aimed at training these models for specific purposes such as anime, photography, or faces.
Midjourney’s Fast vs. Relaxed modes: What’s the difference?
Midjourney offers two modes: Fast and Relaxed.
Fast mode prioritizes speedy image generation with no queue, but is subject to monthly limits even on premium plans.
Relaxed mode offers unlimited usage on Standard and Pro plans, placing image requests in a dynamic queue which takes between one and ten minutes to process.
However, frequent usage can result in lower queue priority. Higher-end plans combine both Fast and Relaxed modes, with unlimited Relaxed hours besides the Fast mode allowances.
How to Subscribe to Midjourney?
To subscribe to Midjourney, join their Discord server via their official website, confirm your invite, and complete a human verification check.
Accept the terms of service in the “newbies” channel. To purchase a subscription, type “/subscribe” in a newbie text channel and follow the personalized link provided.
Select a subscription plan on the payment page, input card details, and proceed to checkout.
Upon confirmation, your subscription will be activated. Subscriptions may vary, with some limiting feature access, e.g., the Basic plan offers 200 generations per month, while others include ‘relaxed hours.’
Payment Methods for Midjourney Subscription
Midjourney subscriptions are processed via Stripe, accepting payment methods including Mastercard, Visa, American Express, China UnionPay, Discover & Diners, eftpos Australia and Japan Credit Bureau.
However, country-specific limitations or restrictions may apply, and can be checked on the official Stripe website.
Frequently Asked Questions about Midjourney Subscriptions
Midjourney’s cost varies by subscription plan. The Basic plan is $10/month for 200 GPU minutes, while the Standard plan is $30/month for 15 Fast GPU hours and unlimited Relaxed GPU hours. The Corporate plan costs $600/year, providing 120 GPU hours annually plus extra benefits. All these plans are 20% cheaper when billed annually. A free trial offering 25 GPU minutes is also available.
For unlimited Midjourney access, subscribing to the Standard plan is recommended as it offers unlimited Relaxed GPU hours. Bypassing free trial limits through multiple accounts is against Midjourney’s terms. Top 1,000 users rating generated images get a free Fast GPU hour daily. Opting for a paid plan is advised for unrestricted, legitimate Midjourney access.
Post-trial, Midjourney usage requires a subscription. The Basic, Standard and Corporate plans will cost you $10, $30 and $60 per month respectively. Annual subscriptions which offer a 20% discount can substantially reduce these costs to $8, $24 and $48 per month respectively.
I am afraid, you can’t currently gift a Midjourney subscription to others.
Yes you can upgrade your plan to any other higher plan whenever you wish.
Midjourney users can access key account details through the /info command. This command will provide comprehensive data about your account, such as the remaining Fast GPU time for your current subscription period, a summary of your usage statistics since the beginning of your subscription, the count of jobs currently queued or running, and the specific date when your subscription is due for renewal. This command will help you to stay up-to-date with your account’s status and activity to manage your usage effectively.
Although Midjourney is getting known as a leading AI image generator, it is important to understand that there is still room for improvement in attaining artist-level outputs in terms of image quality.
A Discord account is required to use Midjourney, primarily via direct messages to the Midjourney bot, which avoids seeing others’ image generations. Future plans may include API access similar to OpenAI,
Yes if you are above the age of 13 years then you are eligible to create a Midjourney account.
Midjourney quantifies usage via “GPU-minutes” and “GPU-hours”, metrics related to compute-time for images. One GPU-minute equates to 1 /imagine, 3 variations, 1 upscale, or 0.7 max-upscales. The Standard Plan offers 15 GPU hours/month, translating to 1060 uses of /imagine. A more typical usage scenario might include 690 uses of /imagine, 230 variations, and 230 upscales.
Conclusion
I hope you found this article helpful to understand the pricing plans of Midjourney.
If you want to read about Midjourney free trial, then read the below post:
Also Read: Midjourney Free Trial: Everything You Need to Know