FLUX by Black Forest Labs vs Midjourney
We give FLUX by Black Forest Labs and Midjourney the same GPA: 2.0 out of 4.0. FLUX by Black Forest Labs grades higher on the free plan. Midjourney grades higher on value for money and features. They get the same grade on ease of use and platforms.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
FLUX by Black Forest Labs
FLUX image and video models, paid per use via API and playground
Midjourney
Image and short-video generator run on monthly GPU time
How we grade them
| 2.0GPAFLUX by Black Forest LabsFair | 2.0GPAMidjourneyFair | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | CNo subscription, so no monthly plan to set against this category. You prepay credits at $0.01 each: a FLUX 3 image costs $0.048 and a Klein one $0.009, so $10 makes about 200 FLUX 3 images. Light use beats any plan here, heavy use won't. | BBasic is $8 a month on yearly billing ($10 monthly), inside this category's cheaper quarter of $9.99. It buys about 200 minutes of fast GPU time and no slower Relax mode. The price is from a third-party summary, as Midjourney's own pages turned our reader away. |
| Free plan and trial | CThe FLUX.2 [klein] 4B weights are free under Apache 2.0, commercial use included, but only if you can run them on your own hardware. The hosted playground and API have no free credits on record. | FNo free plan and no trial on record, so the cheapest way in is $8 a month. And Basic's fast minutes don't roll over if you have a quiet month. |
| Features | CFLUX 3 makes images with accurate text and clips up to 20 seconds with sound, and FLUX Tools erase, outpaint and deblur. For a person, though, the listing shows a playground over an API, with no styles, projects or gallery around it. | BV8 text-to-image, an edit model that fills, swaps and extends with up to four reference images, image-to-video with loops and end frames, and style profiles and moodboards. Nothing in the listing shows a gap in making images. |
| Ease of use | CNo app rating on record. The playground needs no code, but you're buying credits, picking models and resolutions and paying per image, which is a developer's way of working. | CNo app-store rating on record. It runs on the website or as a Discord bot, and it's sold in GPU hours rather than images, so it takes a while to know what a month buys. |
| Platforms and integrations | CA web playground and an API, plus open weights to run on your own machine. No phone app and no integrations in the listing. | CThe midjourney.com website and a Discord bot, and that's it. No phone or desktop app of its own, and no API in the listing. |
| Best for | pay-per-image FLUX models and open weights | stylised images with a distinctive look |
The GPA is the average of the five grades: an A is 4 points, an F is none. The full reasons are on each tool's page: FLUX by Black Forest Labs and Midjourney. How we grade
Where they differ
- FLUX by Black Forest Labs has a free plan. Midjourney does not.
- FLUX by Black Forest Labs is self-hostable, according to its own site.
At a glance
| FLUX by Black Forest Labs | Midjourney | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free plan | Paid |
| Starts at | Not published | $8 per month, billed annually ($10 billed monthly) |
| Free plan | The FLUX.2 [klein] 4B weights are free to download and run yourself under Apache 2.0, commercial use included. The hosted playground and API need bought credits. | None |
| Free trial | None listed | None listed |
| Web | ||
| Made by | Black Forest Labs | Midjourney |
| Price read from | bfl.ai | eesel.ai (not the vendor's own page) |
| Checked | Oct 17, 2026 | Oct 17, 2026 |
Who each one suits
FLUX by Black Forest Labs
- Developers adding image or video generation to their own product
- Teams that want to self-host and fine-tune an image model
- Occasional users who prefer paying per image over a subscription
Midjourney
- Artists and designers who want a distinctive, stylized look
- Heavy users who can wait for jobs in the unlimited Relax mode
- Turning still images into short animated clips
Worth knowing
FLUX by Black Forest Labs
- Hosted use is pay as you go: FLUX 3 Image costs $0.048 per 1K image, Klein $0.009, and FLUX 3 video $0.17 a second at HD.
- There is no subscription for the playground or API, and no published monthly price for any self-hosting license.
- FLUX.2 [klein] 9B, FLUX.2 [dev] and FLUX.1 [dev] weights are non-commercial; running them commercially needs a paid license.
- There is no student discount, and volume discounts on API use are arranged through sales.
Midjourney
- Midjourney's own pricing and help pages turned away our reader, so plan details come from a third-party summary edited June 5, 2026.
- Basic has no Relax mode, so every job draws on its monthly fast time, and unused fast hours do not roll over.
- Private generation (Stealth Mode) starts at Pro; on Basic and Standard, images appear in the public gallery.
- Companies with more than $1 million in yearly gross revenue must be on Pro or Mega to use images commercially.
Key features
FLUX by Black Forest Labs
- FLUX 3 image and video
- One model family covers images with accurate text rendering and video clips of up to 20 seconds with optional generated speech, effects and ambience.
- Image editing tools
- FLUX.2 models edit images from a prompt, and FLUX Tools add outpainting, object erasing and deblurring.
- Browser playground
- Try the models without code in the playground, which charges the same credit prices as the API.
- API with prepaid credits
- Credits cost $0.01 each, are shared across an organization's projects, do not expire, and can be topped up automatically.
- Open weights
- Models such as FLUX 3 Image Klein and FLUX.2 [klein] can be downloaded from Hugging Face and GitHub and fine-tuned on your own hardware.
Midjourney
- Text-to-image with V8 models
- V8.1 became the default model in June 2026 and V8.2 followed in July, with an HD setting that renders at a higher resolution.
- Image editing
- The V8.2 edit model changes images from written instructions, fills or replaces chosen areas, extends the canvas and takes up to four reference images.
- Image-to-video
- Any image, including an uploaded one, can be animated into short clips that can be extended, looped or given a set end frame.
- Personalization and moodboards
- Rating images builds a personal style profile, and moodboards or style references steer new images toward a chosen look.
- Conversational mode
- A text and voice mode on the website takes requests in plain language and can use the reference images and settings already in place.
- Organize page
- Past jobs can be searched, filtered and sorted into folders on the website.
Plans
FLUX by Black Forest Labs
FLUX.2 [klein] 4B open weights$0
Download from Hugging Face and host it yourself under Apache 2.0, with free commercial use.
Builder licenseCustom
Self-serve monthly license bought in the dashboard; price not published. 10K images a month, 1 domain, 10 users.
Platform licenseCustom
For products offering FLUX to their own users: 100K images a month on 1 domain, sold through sales.
Professional licenseCustom
For agencies making images for named clients: 100K images a month, first 3 clients included, sold through sales.
EnterpriseCustom
All models and new releases, custom volume, volume discounts and an SLA, with combined API and weights pricing.
Midjourney
Basic$8
per month, billed annually ($10 billed monthly)
About 3.3 hours (200 minutes) of fast GPU time a month and no Relax mode; SD video only.
Standard$24
per month, billed annually ($30 billed monthly)
15 fast GPU hours a month plus unlimited image jobs in the slower Relax mode.
Pro$48
per month, billed annually ($60 billed monthly)
30 fast GPU hours, Stealth Mode for private images, unlimited SD video in Relax mode and 12 fast jobs at once.
Mega$96
per month, billed annually ($120 billed monthly)
60 fast GPU hours a month, with everything in Pro and more video jobs at once.
