Midjourney

When it comes to AI image generators, you have a plethora of options these days. Two prominent ones in the pack are Midjourney and Grok 2. Midjourney is renowned for its ability to create stunningly lifelike images, while Grok 2 is known for its capability to bring virtually any imagined idea to the screen, regardless of copyright restrictions or societal norms. This article provides essential facts about each to help you determine which is better suited for you.

Pricing and Tiers

Midjourney

If you want to explore either platform, you’ll need to shell out some cash. Neither offers a free tier. X (formerly Twitter) offers the X Premium account at $7 per month, which provides half the number of ads and a “larger reply boost” compared to the baseline site experience. The $14/month Premium+ package eliminates ads entirely and allows you to write articles as well as tweets. Both subscriptions grant early access to Grok. On the other hand, Midjourney offers four subscription levels, which can be billed monthly or annually. The Basic plan costs $10 per month and grants 3.3 hours of Fast GPU time per month. You can purchase additional access time for $4 each. The $30/month Standard plan increases your Fast GPU access to 15 hours per month with unlimited “Relax” GPU time. The $60 Pro Plan offers 30 hours of Fast GPU time per month, along with additional slots in the processing queue. And for a whopping $120 per month, the Mega plan provides 60 Fast GPU hours per month. It’s important to note that if your company generates over $1,000,000 in gross revenue annually, you’re required to opt for a Pro or Mega plan.

What is Grok, and What Can It Do?

Grok is a chatbot developed by xAI, founded by Elon Musk after he left OpenAI’s board due to a governance issue. The original Grok-1 model was released in November 2023 and, according to Musk, was trained on a cluster of “tens of thousands” of GPUs. Grok-1.5 superseded Grok-1 in March 2024, and was later surpassed by Grok-2, which emerged in August 2024. Grok primarily functions as a chatbot, similar to ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, or Copilot. It is trained on a combination of publicly sourced internet data (up to the second half of 2023) and X user data. Grok is unique in that it is directly integrated with the X social media platform, enabling it to access real-time information from there, just like other chatbots can perform internet searches to find details about events that occurred after their knowledge cutoff dates. This allows Grok to stay updated on world events, but it could also make it more prone to hallucinating facts and providing inappropriate responses to user queries, given its source material. For example, Grok 2 doesn’t seem to care much about copyright, as evidenced by the excitement it generated when it debuted in August. Unlike other chatbots, its image creation capabilities lack discernible safety guardrails to prevent the generation of copyrighted, violent, racist, or harmful images.

Grok 2 doesn’t give a damn about copyright lmao

This will be fun while it lasts pic.twitter.com/qiiScOGt8I

— Brendon (@Bmaynze) August 14, 2024

The latest version of Grok, Grok-2, is the first to offer image generation capabilities, thanks to its integration with the Flux.1 model developed by Black Forrest Labs. When Grok-2 debuted in August, it made waves because, unlike other chatbots, its image creation doesn’t have any safety measures to prevent the generation of copyrighted, violent, or harmful images.

What is Midjourney, and What Can It Do?

Midjourney is one of the pioneers of the AI image generation revolution, along with Dall-E and Stable Diffusion. While it doesn’t have a chatbot component like Grok, it creates images based on your natural language prompts either through a Discord bot or the company’s web editor. It can generate pictures in a wide variety of styles, from cartoony animations and hand-drawn illustrations to photorealistic glamour shots. For instance, you might remember the “Pope in a puffy jacket” meme from 2023. Midjourney first became available as an open beta in 2022 and has undergone multiple iterations, with the latest version, version 6.1, released in late July 2024. Midjourney has already made a name for itself as a premier image generator, with its art appearing on the covers of renowned publications like The Economist and The Atlantic. It even won first place in the digital art competition at the 2022 Colorado State Fair with its piece “Théâtre D’Opéra Spatial,” which is shown below.

Midjourney

Unlike Grok, Midjourney (starting from version 5) utilizes an AI-based content moderation system that is more sophisticated than the banned word system it previously used. While the old system simply prohibited the generation of pornographic and violent themes and specific keywords like the names of religious and political figures, the new moderation scheme offers more context-dependent flexibility. That is, you can now generate an image of Chinese President Xi Jinping (which was impossible under the old rules), but you still can’t get one of him in handcuffs (unless you use Grok).

Which is Better for You?

Midjourney is clearly the better choice. Unless you’re intent on violating copyright laws or spreading misinformation ahead of the November presidential election, there’s no reason to support Elon Musk’s failing social media site with your $7 per month. Midjourney offers a reliable and feature-rich image generation experience without the potential risks and limitations of Grok. It has already proven its worth in the world of art and creativity, and with its advanced content moderation system, it provides a more secure and appropriate environment for users.

Recommended Videos

Here are some recommended videos related to this topic:

• Video 1: A detailed comparison of Midjourney and Grok
• Video 2: Insights into the image generation capabilities of both platforms
• Video 3: User experiences and feedback on Midjourney and Grok