Is Midjourney Free in 2026? Trial, Cheapest Plan and Limits
No. Midjourney has no free web or Discord plan as of October 21, 2026. The cheapest paid route is Basic at $8/mo billed yearly ($96 up front) for 200 Fast minutes. The niji·journey iOS listing is the only trial, at 20 generations. Bing Image Creator, with 15 fast images a day, is the free browser alternative.
A free starting tier is normal for this category, and Midjourney is the exception people keep tripping over. Toolradar data: Toolradar tracks 171 AI image generation tools as of October 21, 2026, and 125 of them (73%) have a free tier. Midjourney is one of the 46 that do not. The count is on the AI image generation statistics page, and the product record is Midjourney on Toolradar. The choice left is a paid pool you will finish, or a different tool that still has a free start.
What each Midjourney plan costs for a year of images
The buyer in this table is a solo user, under the revenue line below, who wants about a month of ordinary image prompts for a full year. Midjourney says one image prompt usually takes about one minute of GPU time, so the Basic Fast pool matches that habit and a heavier month belongs on Standard. Yearly Basic is the cheapest plan here only if you stay through the last month.
| Plan | Year's cost | Fast GPU time | Relax images | Stealth | Video |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic, yearly | $96 ($8/mo), paid up front | 3.3 hr/mo (200 min) | No | No | SD, Fast only |
| Basic, monthly | $10/mo ($120 over 12 months) | 3.3 hr/mo (200 min) | No | No | SD, Fast only |
| Standard, yearly | $288 ($24/mo), paid up front | 15 hr/mo | Unlimited | No | SD and HD, Fast only |
| Standard, monthly | $30/mo | 15 hr/mo | Unlimited | No | SD and HD, Fast only |
| Pro, yearly | $576 ($48/mo), paid up front | 30 hr/mo | Unlimited, plus SD video | Yes | SD and HD; Relax for SD |
| Pro, monthly | $60/mo | 30 hr/mo | Unlimited, plus SD video | Yes | SD and HD; Relax for SD |
| Mega, yearly | $1,152, paid up front | 60 hr/mo | Unlimited, plus SD video | Yes | SD and HD; Relax for SD |
| Mega, monthly | $120/mo | 60 hr/mo | Unlimited, plus SD video | Yes | SD and HD; Relax for SD |
Prices were checked on October 21, 2026 on Midjourney's plan comparison. The same page prices extra GPU time at $4/hr on every plan. Yearly billing is a 20% discount, and the full year is charged on day one, which pays off only if you still want the pool in month twelve.
The ranking flips if you stop after one month, since monthly Basic is $10 for that month while yearly Basic still takes $96 on the day you subscribe, even if you cancel before month two. How to subscribe says the yearly tab is already selected, so a short test has to switch to monthly before paying or the annual total is what gets charged.
Twelve months at that monthly rate is $120, which is $24 more than the yearly charge, and unused Fast time does not come back on either cycle, so a quiet month cannot fund a busy one.
Does Midjourney have a free trial?
A limited trial exists only in the niji·journey app for iOS and Android, so the website and Discord still have no free start. Midjourney's free-trials article says no free trial is currently available in Discord or on the midjourney.com website. The US App Store listing, from Midjourney, Inc., describes 20 free generations. The Google Play listing does not state a generation count, so the stores do not match. The help article does not say whether those generations renew or are cleared for commercial use, which keeps the trial off client work.
That trial is an anime app, not a free month of the website. Accounts can sync with a subscription later, which helps only after you already plan to pay, and it is not a back door into Relax mode, Stealth, or the Basic Fast pool.
Without a subscription you can still open the public Explore gallery, which is enough to study style and not enough to deliver a picture, and you cannot generate on the website or in Discord. Rating can award Fast time, but that award is not a free plan. The earning guide says you need an active subscription to receive or use awarded time, it expires 30 days after it is given, and only the top 2,000 raters each day get one extra Fast hour.
How many images does the Basic plan include?
Basic buys a monthly pool of Fast GPU minutes, not a stack of image files. The GPU speed guide says one image prompt usually takes about one minute, so ordinary prompts run at about one a minute until the pool is gone. An SD prompt is about 0.8 minutes, which is 250 prompts from a full pool, and an HD prompt is about 1.3 minutes, about 154 prompts. Upscales, odd aspect ratios, and older versions can cost more, while variations often cost less, so a week of posts fits and a daily client round does not.
On monthly Basic, the monthly rate in the table divided by the full pool is $0.05 per minute if you use every minute, and the yearly monthly rate over the same minutes is $0.04. Both figures are our arithmetic, not a per-image fee, and leftover Fast minutes vanish at renewal on either billing cycle, per the expiration note, so an uneven month should not be prepaid for a year.
Video spends that clock faster, so clips hit the cap long before stills do. The video guide prices a default batch of 4 SD videos at 8 minutes, so the Basic pool covers 25 of those batches, and one SD video is 2 minutes. A batch of 4 HD videos is 26 minutes, and Basic cannot generate HD. Higher plans can generate HD only in Fast mode, and Relax video, which does not spend Fast time, starts on Pro.
Turbo mode spends double the Fast time and is not available on V8.1. The default model is V8.2, which became the default on July 24, 2026, and the GPU speed guide does not say whether Turbo runs on that version. A blocked prompt does not spend GPU time, so a rejection is not a reason to buy hours.
Extra Fast time is $4/hr, it expires after 60 days, it is non-refundable, and it is unusable if the subscription lapses, per purchasing extra Fast time. Included time on monthly Basic is about $3.03 per hour (that month's price divided by 3.3 hours), so one extra hour can cover a deadline and a habit of extra hours is a reason to change tier.
What forces an upgrade from Basic?
Stay on Basic if the Fast pool in the table covers your month, a public gallery is acceptable, and you do not need HD video. V8.2 is the default on every paid plan, so paying more does not change the image model.
Move to Standard when you would otherwise keep buying hours. Five extra hours on monthly Basic cost $20, and that plus the monthly Basic price lands on $30, which is the Standard monthly price. Standard then includes 15 Fast hours plus unlimited Relax images. Relax waits from 0 to 30 minutes, usually less if you use it less than other people, and permutation prompts, the repeat parameter, HD video, and the legacy Max Upscale are off in Relax. The queue fits a hobbyist who can wait, and a deadline is a reason to stay in Fast and buy hours instead.
Pro is the next step for two separate problems. Stealth mode, which keeps images and videos private on the Midjourney website, is only on Pro and Mega. A company, or an employee of a company, with more than $1,000,000 a year in gross revenue must be on Pro or Mega to own the assets, and Standard's unlimited images fix neither. Mega raises the Fast pool to 60 hours and allows 12 concurrent Fast videos, against 6 on Pro, with no new ownership rule. If you need privacy or you are over that revenue line, Pro yearly at $48/mo ($576 up front) is the cheapest plan that qualifies.
Concurrency is the other silent cap, and it matters only if you fire many jobs at once. Basic runs 3 Fast image jobs and 1 Fast video at a time, with a repeat size of 4. Standard stays at 3 concurrent image jobs and raises video to 3 Fast. Pro jumps to 12 Fast image jobs, or 3 Relax, and a repeat size of 40, which is wasted money if you work one prompt at a time.
Can you use Basic images commercially?
Yes, for a person or a company at or under $1,000,000 a year in gross revenue, which fits a freelancer and not an employee of a firm over that line. Using images and videos commercially says you own what you create and can keep using it after you cancel. Upscaling someone else's image leaves ownership with the original creator, and a business over the revenue line needs Pro or Mega.
The terms, effective May 27, 2026, add a license the other way. You grant Midjourney a perpetual license to reproduce and distribute your prompts and outputs, so paying does not make the file secret. Stealth, on Pro and Mega, is a best-effort promise not to publish on the website, and a public Discord channel stays visible even with Stealth on. The terms allow one user per account and one account per user, so a team cannot share a login. The community guidelines say Midjourney does not offer an API except in rare cases it explicitly grants, and automating the product can get the account blocked.
Schools and nonprofits pay the sticker, with no education discount. Educational use requires a personal account and a personal card for each student, so a class cannot share one subscription. Group billing starts at 50 yearly Pro or Mega plans, adds no further discount, and includes no admin controls. If a Basic file is going to a client, read how to make money with AI art and how to sell AI art first. The license is not a copyright registration, and Midjourney says it cannot advise you on copyright.
What are the free alternatives, and where do they stop?
These five substitute for a test image, not for a Midjourney subscription, and none of them is ranked here as a better model. The wider free list is best free AI image generators, and the paid field is best AI image generators. Toolradar lists Midjourney as an alternative to 82 tools in that category, checked the same day. Use one of these for a picture today if a public file or a daily cap is acceptable.
| Tool | Free allowance | What the free plan withholds | First paid step |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bing Image Creator | 15 fast creations a day, then a slower free speed, up to 200 prompts per 24 hours | Work and school Microsoft accounts | No paid image plan on the FAQ |
| Leonardo.Ai | 150 fast tokens a day, reset daily | Private images and full ownership | Essential, $12/mo |
| Ideogram | 30 credits a week with Google, Apple, or Microsoft sign-in | Private images; email signups get no credits | Plus, $20/mo or $15/mo billed yearly |
| Adobe Firefly | Daily generations across image, video, and audio, no count published | A number you can plan a project around | Standard, $9.99/mo for 2,000 credits |
| Google Search AI Mode | Up to 25 images in 24 hours without a Google AI plan | A studio, and any higher cap | A Google AI plan, limits on the help page |
Bing Image Creator's FAQ refills the 15 fast creations and the 200-prompt cap the next day. Slower free speed continues after the fast allowance is used, and each "Edit image" click counts toward that cap, so edits spend the same daily limit. A personal Microsoft account is required, a work or school Entra ID cannot sign in, a visible watermark is optional, and the FAQ states no commercial license.
Leonardo's pricing page gives Free 150 fast tokens a day and marks those images public. A token is not one image, so the daily number is not a picture count, and free users get a non-exclusive commercial license while Leonardo keeps rights to reuse the files. That fits a mood board, not a logo you must own. Essential, at $12/mo before tax, is the first private plan, paid subscribers keep ownership, and yearly billing is offered at up to 20% off. The interface is covered in how to use Leonardo AI.
Ideogram's plans document gives 30 credits a week after a Google, Apple, or Microsoft sign-in, and an email-and-password account gets none, so refusing those logins means there is no free plan to use. Free images are public, and Plus, at $20/mo or $15/mo billed yearly ($180 for the year), is the first plan that keeps new images private. The pricing FAQ says the weekly free amount may vary, so do not schedule a campaign on that weekly figure.
Adobe Firefly's plans page includes free daily generations for image, video, and audio, with no published count, and the allowance refreshes every day, so you can try a frame and cannot promise a batch. Standard, at $9.99/mo for 2,000 credits, is the first allowance you can schedule. Is Adobe Firefly free covers what Adobe leaves unsaid about free files.
Google's Search help page caps AI Mode at 25 images in 24 hours without a Google AI plan, for adults on a personal Google account, including in the United States. Google says the cap can change with demand and that Search settings are being updated. It is a search box, not a private studio. The Gemini app is a separate product, covered in is Gemini free.
Is Midjourney better than ChatGPT for images?
They answer different jobs, and this page cannot score taste. ChatGPT's pricing page includes limited image creation on the free plan and does not print an image count, while Pro is described there as unlimited and faster image creation. Check the current paid price on that page before you compare bills, because a chat image and a GPU minute are not the same unit.
Use ChatGPT for a few pictures inside a chat you already have open, or to edit one image with a sentence. Use Midjourney when the picture is the work and you can pay the yearly Basic charge. Prompt structure is in how to write AI image prompts, the ChatGPT path is in how to use ChatGPT to create images, and motion from a still starts in how to animate AI art.
When Basic is enough
Yearly Basic fits a solo maker who will still be prompting in month twelve, inside the Fast pool in the table, under the revenue line, with a public gallery. Monthly Basic fits a short test, because the whole year is not due on day one. Standard, at $288 for the year, is the move when you will pass that pool and can wait. Pro is for Stealth or a company over the revenue line, and Mega is for the largest Fast pool or many videos at once. A free tool above fits a sample you can accept as public or capped.
Methodology
We read Midjourney's plan comparison, free-trials article, GPU speed guide, video guide, commercial-use article, and terms on October 21, 2026, plus the niji·journey listings on the US App Store and Google Play. Alternative limits come from each vendor's own pricing or help page the same day: Bing Image Creator, Leonardo.Ai, Ideogram, Adobe Firefly, and Google Search. The 171-tool count and the 73% free-tier share come from Toolradar's AI image generation statistics, checked the same day. Per-minute rates and prompt counts marked as arithmetic are ours, from Midjourney's printed minutes and prices. We did not generate images for this page.
FAQ
Is Midjourney free in 2026?
No. There is no free plan on midjourney.com or in Discord, so both stop at a subscription. The cheapest paid plan is Basic at $8/mo billed yearly, with the full year charged up front. A limited trial exists only in the niji·journey mobile app, and it does not open the website.
Does Midjourney have a free trial?
Only in the niji·journey app, and it is a mobile anime trial rather than a free month of the website or Discord. The help center does not publish a generation count, the US App Store listing says 20 free generations, and the Google Play listing does not give a number, so the two stores are not the same offer. Nothing in the help article says the trial renews or that those images are cleared for commercial use, which keeps the trial off client work.
What is the cheapest Midjourney plan?
For a full year of ordinary prompts, yearly Basic is cheapest at $96 up front, and it wins only if you stay through the last month. For a single month, monthly Basic is cheaper, at $10, because the yearly plan charges the whole year on day one. Standard is the first plan with unlimited Relax images, at $30/mo or $288 for the year.
How many images can I make on the Basic plan?
About 200 ordinary image prompts a month, because one image prompt usually takes about one minute and the Basic Fast pool matches that pace. SD prompts are about 0.8 minutes, about 250 from a full pool, and HD prompts about 1.3 minutes, about 154. A default batch of 4 SD videos costs 8 minutes, and unused minutes do not roll over.
Can I use Midjourney images commercially on the Basic plan?
Yes, if you are not a company, and not an employee of a company, with more than $1,000,000 a year in gross revenue. Over that line you need Pro or Mega to own the assets. You also grant Midjourney a license to the images, and Basic cannot turn on Stealth, so images from that plan are public.
What is a free alternative to Midjourney?
Bing Image Creator gives 15 fast creations a day, then a slower free speed, up to 200 prompts in 24 hours, and it requires a personal Microsoft account. Leonardo.Ai gives 150 fast tokens a day, and a token is not a finished picture. Ideogram gives 30 credits a week on a social login, with nothing for an email signup. Adobe Firefly gives daily generations with no published count. Google Search AI Mode allows up to 25 images in 24 hours without a Google AI plan. The wider set is best free AI image generators.
Is Midjourney better than ChatGPT for images?
ChatGPT's free plan includes limited image creation and does not publish a count, so use it for a few images inside a chat you already have open. Midjourney publishes a GPU budget and charges for it, starting at the yearly Basic price, so use it when the image is the deliverable and you can pay for a known pool of minutes.
Can I browse Midjourney or earn free GPU time without paying?
You can view public images on the Explore page without a subscription, but you cannot generate on the website or in Discord without one, so the gallery is a reference and not a studio. Rating can award one Fast hour to the top 2,000 raters in a day, and only an active subscriber can receive or spend that hour, which makes rating useless until you already pay.
Cite this: Dupple, "Is Midjourney Free in 2026? Trial, Cheapest Plan and Limits", October 2026.
The free plan people search for is not on the website, and Basic is the cheapest way in once you know you will use the minutes. Try Dupple X →
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