How we rate AI image tools

Every generator here makes an image from a prompt, starts from an image you upload, matches a reference style and edits what it made, so none of that earns a point. What is left is what separates them: how large the image comes out, whether text inside it is readable, keeping a character the same across images, steering with a pose or a sketch, training a style on your own pictures, extending past the frame, upscaling, cutting out a background and true vectors.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 30 of the 100.

What you can do beyond typing a prompt: a public API, a batch in one run, a seed you can fix so a result repeats, saying what to leave out, having the prompt rewritten for you, and running the model on your own hardware.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 20 of the 100.

Whether it trains on what you make, whether you own the result, whether you may sell it, whether the vendor would cover a copyright claim, and whether your generations can be kept private.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 20 of the 100.

What the cheapest paid plan costs each month, a free tier, and a trial. Where a vendor sells credits by the image instead of a plan, or hides the price behind a sign-in, the page says so rather than showing a number nobody published.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 20 of the 100.

Whether the weights are published under a named licence, how many ways there are to reach support, and where it runs.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 10 of the 100.

How many models it puts in front of you, training a style on your own images, video, editing an image, upscaling, keeping a character consistent and matching a reference style. All of them have a free tier, so that earns no points here.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 30 of the 100.

The part a generator on its own does not have: a public gallery, challenges, building on someone else's image, and a phone app.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 15 of the 100.

Whether it trains on what you make, whether you may sell it, whether you own it, whether your generations can be private, and whether the vendor would cover a copyright claim. Two of these platforms release everything as CC0, which means you may sell it and nobody owns it.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 25 of the 100.

What the cheapest paid plan costs, whether the free allowance that refreshes is published at all, a plan the vendor calls unlimited, and whether free images come out watermarked.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 30 of the 100.

The work these are bought for: training a private model on your own pictures, putting your product into a new scene, generating a person with it or a headshot, storing brand colours and fonts, keeping a character consistent, templates and readable text. Every one of them matches a reference style, edits images and removes backgrounds, so none of that earns a point.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 35 of the 100.

Getting volume out: an API, a batch in one run, generating from a list or a product feed, a shared workspace, and publishing to social networks. Not one of them connects to a shop or a product catalogue.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 20 of the 100.

Whether it trains on the photographs you upload, whether the model you trained stays yours, whether you own the output, and whether the vendor would cover a copyright claim. This matters more here than anywhere else in the category, because the whole product is uploading your own pictures.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 25 of the 100.

What the cheapest paid plan costs each month, a free tier and a trial.

Each section adds up to 10, then counts for 20 of the 100.