No, Midjourney is no longer free to use on Discord. [1, 2] While the groundbreaking AI art generator originally launched with a popular free trial program, the company has shifted entirely to a paid-only subscription model [1, 2].
If you are looking to create AI art with Midjourney, here is a complete breakdown of how the platform operates today, why the free trial vanished, and how you can still access the tool [1, 2].
The Disappearance of the Free Trial
When Midjourney exploded onto the tech scene in 2022, it offered every new user 25 free generations (measured in “GPU minutes”) [1]. This allowed millions of people to experiment with prompt engineering directly inside Discord servers [1].
However, in the spring of 2023, Midjourney’s leadership officially paused the free trial program [1, 3]. The decision was driven by two massive challenges:
System Overload: An unprecedented wave of viral popularity caused massive server strain, slowing down generation speeds for paying members.
Account Abuse: Users were systematically creating “burner” Discord accounts to bypass limits and stack free generations indefinitely.
While Midjourney occasionally opens brief, temporary windows of free access to celebrate major version updates, these events are rare, unannounced, and usually last for only a weekend.
Current Midjourney Pricing Plans
To use Midjourney on Discord today, you must choose one of their four premium subscription tiers. All plans offer unlimited generations, but they differ based on “Fast GPU hours”—the high-priority processing time that generates images in under a minute. Monthly Cost (Billed Monthly) Annual Cost (Paid Yearly) Fast GPU Time / Month Basic Plan $10 / month $8 / month 3.3 Hours (~200 images) Commercial usage rights, access to member gallery. Standard Plan $30 / month
$24 / month
Unlimited “Relax” mode (slower, free generations after Fast hours run out). Pro Plan $60 / month
$48 / month
Stealth mode (hide images from the public gallery), 12 concurrent fast jobs. Mega Plan $120 / month
$96 / month
Stealth mode, 12 concurrent fast jobs, ideal for power users and studios.
Beyond Discord: The Web Alpha
For years, Discord was the exclusive home of Midjourney. However, the ecosystem has evolved. Midjourney now hosts a dedicated web-based platform (Midjourney.com) where users can generate, view, and organize images via a sleek browser interface instead of using Discord text commands.
Note: The web platform shares the exact same subscription model; there is no separate free version for the website.
Top Free Alternatives to Midjourney
If you aren’t ready to commit to a monthly subscription, several high-quality AI image generators offer completely free daily or monthly limits:
Stable Diffusion (via Clipdrop or DreamStudio): An incredibly powerful, open-source model that gives users a set amount of free daily generations.
Adobe Firefly: Built with creator safety in mind, Adobe offers monthly “generative credits” for free accounts.
Microsoft Designer (Image Creator): Powered by OpenAI’s DALL-E 3, this tool is completely free to use via a Microsoft account and delivers exceptional prompt accuracy.
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