Midjourney vs. DALL·E: Which AI Art Generator Is Better?

As digital art becomes more accessible through AI, creators face a new dilemma. Which AI art generator should they use to bring their vision to life?

Platforms like Midjourney and DALL·E offer unique features, but the choice isn’t always clear-cut.

For digital artists and content creators looking to elevate their projects, understanding the differences between Midjourney vs. DALL·E is crucial to choosing the right tool for the job.

So, what are we waiting for? Let’s get started! 🖼️

⏰ 60-Second Summary

Midjourney vs. DALL·E—two of the most popular AI art generators—offer unique strengths for digital artists, designers, and content creators.

  • Here are the key comparisons:
    • DALL·E: Ideal for fast, user-friendly AI image generation, seamless ChatGPT integration, and simple edits
    • Midjourney: Best for highly detailed, stylized visuals with advanced customization via Discord
  • A feature breakdown for both Midjourney and DALL·E:
    • Ease of use: DALL·E has an intuitive chat-based interface; Midjourney requires Discord and prompt expertise
    • Image style: Midjourney produces high-quality, artistic images; DALL·E excels at structured, vibrant visuals
    • Customization: Midjourney offers deeper control over artistic details; DALL·E enables quick edits and expansions
  • AI art is just the beginning. ClickUp helps you organize, collaborate, and streamline creative projects with:
    • ClickUp Brain for AI-powered task management and image generation
    • ClickUp Whiteboards for real-time brainstorming, AI image generation, and visual planning
    • ClickUp for Design Teams to track feedback, deadlines, and creative workflows
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What Is DALL·E?

DALL·E is a generative artificial intelligence (AI) technology developed by OpenAI that allows users to create images from text prompts. It uses advanced text-to-graphic technologies to transform textual descriptions into visual representations.

DALL-E 3 interface in ChatGPT
Access the DALL·E interface via ChatGPT

The AI image generator uses deep learning models and a large language model (LLM) to understand natural language prompts and generate images.

🧠 Fun Fact: OpenAI combined the surrealist artist Salvador Dalí and Pixar’s robot WALL·E to create the name ‘DALL·E,’ reflecting its ability to generate dreamlike images from simple text prompts.

DALL·E features

From transforming text prompts into detailed visuals to offering high-quality image outputs, DALL·E has extensive features. The platform lets you create custom designs, edit existing images, experiment with unique concept combinations, and explore graphic design trends

Let’s understand its standout features in detail. 💁

Feature #1: High-quality image generation

DALL·E has improved greatly in terms of image resolution. The latest version, DALL·E 3, can create images at 1024 x 1024 pixels, a significant leap from its earlier version. This results in sharper, more detailed visuals, crucial for professional applications such as marketing materials, game assets, or high-quality artwork.

Use prompt engineering to create high-quality images : midjourney vs dalle
Ask the AI model to create images as per your specifications

Plus, users can choose between ‘standard’ and ‘HD’ quality, with the latter offering even higher detail at a slightly higher cost.

Feature #2: Editing, retouching, and customization

Change the same prompt to create different images : midjourney vs dalle
Customize images already generated by DALL·E

DALL·E lets you modify existing images.

Known as Inpainting, this feature enables you to upload an image and then specify changes through a text prompt. For instance, you can upload a picture of a room and ask the AI to add a vase of flowers to the table. This makes image editing faster and more intuitive.

Additionally, it creates highly customized images. You can specify attributes like color, style, texture, and lighting. This level of control makes it perfect for creating visuals that match exact specifications for branding, character design, and product prototypes. It also supports multiple image orientations, including landscape and portrait.

🔍 Did You Know? The global AI image generator market size is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 17.7% from 2024 to 2030. This shows rapid progress in deep learning and AI algorithms.

Feature #3: Conceptual fusion, fine-grained control, and expand image functions

DALL·E is great at blending multiple concepts, styles, and attributes into a single image.

Want a robot playing a saxophone in a jungle, painted in Van Gogh’s style? DALL·E can handle that. This flexibility allows creators to experiment with complex compositions and imaginative ideas.

Expand the images generated with ease
Alter the existing image further through detailed prompts

Plus, its Outpainting feature lets you extend an image beyond its original boundaries. The AI seamlessly generates new content that fits with the existing visual, which is perfect for creating larger versions of images or naturally expanding scenes.

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DALL·E pricing

  • Custom pricing

🔍 Did You Know? In 2023, an AI-generated image of a fake explosion near the Pentagon went viral, briefly causing confusion in the stock market before it was debunked.

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What Is Midjourney?

Midjourney is a text-to-picture artificial intelligence service developed by an independent research lab. It generates images from textual descriptions, allowing you to create various art forms, from realistic to abstract styles. It’s known for producing high-quality, well-structured, and detailed photos.

The AI model uses machine learning to create images based on text prompt examples and relies on large language and diffusion models.

To use Midjourney, you need a Discord account. The AI processes the request and generates images by typing the command ‘/imagine’ with a description of the desired image in a channel.

🧠 Fun Fact: Since AI models learn from existing art, there are ongoing legal debates over whether AI-generated images can be copyrighted and who truly owns them—the AI developer, the user, the creator whose original idea might have been borrowed from, or no one at all.

Midjourney features

Midjourney has robust capabilities designed to bring creative visions to life with precision and ease. Let’s look at some standout features. 👇

Feature #1: User-friendly interface and customization options

Operating primarily through Discord, users can easily interact with the AI by typing simple commands in the chat. This straightforward approach requires no technical expertise or coding skills, making it easy for anyone to start generating AI art.

Midjourney creates abstract art : midjourney vs dalle
Midjourney’s interface in Discord

Users can share their creations, ask questions, and collaborate with others. Plus, Midjourney offers extensive customization options with various commands and parameters. You can fine-tune every aspect of your creation by adjusting the aspect ratio and stylization for specific artistic styles.

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Feature #2: Advanced composition tools

For users looking to push their creativity further, Midjourney provides powerful composition tools. This includes:

  • Layering techniques to create images with depth and complexity and add a sense of visual hierarchy
  • Perspective adjustments to adjust the perspective of the images for dynamic and engaging compositions
  • Spatial reasoning to create logically coherent images with relative positions and sizes of different objects
Alter the Midjourney image effortlessly to look like an actual painting
Customize the generated image with ease

🧠 Fun Fact: In 2018, Portrait of Edmond de Belamy, an AI-generated painting created using a machine learning model called GANs (Generative Adversarial Networks), sold at Christie’s auction house for an astonishing $432,500—far exceeding its estimated price of $7,000-$10,000.

Feature #3: Collaboration features and cross-modal generation capabilities

Midjourney’s Discord server fosters a thriving community that enhances the creative process. Through shared workspaces, users can collaborate on projects in real time, exchange feedback, and even integrate project management tools like Trello and Asana to streamline their workflows.

Midjourney bot in Discord : midjourney vs dalle
Directly message the Midjourney bot in Discord

Additionally, it offers cross-modal capabilities to synthesize elements from different modes like text, images, and sketches. These include:

Midjourney pricing

  • Basic: $10/month per user
  • Standard: $30/month per user
  • Pro: $60/month per user
  • Mega: $120/month per user

🧠 Fun Fact: An AI model created a fully digital fashion collection called ‘DeepWear,’ generating unique clothing designs that could be 3D-printed or worn in virtual spaces like the metaverse.

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DALL·E vs. Midjourney: Features Compared

Now that we’ve explored DALL·E and Midjourney individually, it’s time to see how they measure up side by side.

Here, we’ll compare the key differences between the two tools to help you decide which suits your artistic vision. ⚒️

AspectDALL·EMidjourney
Ease of useBeginner-friendly with a simple interfaceSteeper learning curve because of its Discord-based interface
Image qualityProduces photorealistic images with fine details and vivid colorsDelivers artistic, stylized images with standout textures and bold creativity
Image styleVersatile, accommodating all art stylesSupports all art styles and excels at creating unique art
Image sizeSquare, tall, and wideFully customizable dimensions
AI images copyrightFull ownership of all the images you have createdFull ownership of created images
Customization optionsLimited customization optionsMore customization options with control over input parameters
InterfaceSimple web-based interfaceOperates entirely within Discord
Iterative developmentEnables iterative creation with image input refinementProvides variations based on initial prompts

Feature #1: Ownership and content moderation

When creating with AI, understanding who owns the final product and how the platform handles inappropriate content is essential. Let’s explore how these generative AI tools address ownership and moderation.

DALL·E

DALL·E excels in ownership and content moderation due to its in-depth policies and indemnification. OpenAI has established detailed terms of use, privacy policies, and guidelines for services, data processing, and plugins.

Midjourney

Midjourney uploads a strict content moderation policy and offers image privacy features. However, generated images on the platform are visible to other subscribers by default unless users upgrade to higher-tier plans for the Stealth Mode feature. 

🏆 Winner: DALL·E for its strict privacy policies and indemnification.

Feature #2: Image quality

The quality of AI-generated images can make or break your creative projects. Let’s see how these tools deliver in terms of detail, clarity, and style.

DALL·E

It generates captivating, vivid images with fine details at a standard quality of 1024 x 1024 pixels. DALL·E is also capable of generating photorealistic, detailed photos that emphasize realism. However, while its pictures are richly rendered, they can appear more stylized and animated.

Midjourney

The tool often produces images with high quality, realism, and sharpness, capturing delicate nuances with great accuracy. It excels in photorealism and delivers professional-grade images with ornate visuals. Midjourney’s maximum image resolution is 1664 x 1664 pixels, which you can upscale with AI tools.

🏆 Winner: Midjourney for its higher degree of realism and precision.

🧠 Fun Fact: In 2022, an AI-generated artwork titled Théâtre D’opéra Spatial won first place in the digital art category at the Colorado State Fair, sparking debates about whether AI-generated pieces should compete against human-created art.

Feature #3: Ease of use

A tool’s usability can greatly impact your workflow. Let’s look at how each platform caters to different user experience preferences.

DALL·E

DALL·E features a minimalistic interface with ChatGPT, making it conversational and easy to use across multiple platforms. You can interact with the system in layman’s language, and ChatGPT will generate tailored prompts or provide AI prompt templates for DALL·E 3, promoting intuitive image creation.

Midjourney

On the other hand, Midjourney requires you to have a good understanding of prompting techniques to achieve desired results. While it offers a web interface that simplifies image generation, you still must know how to prompt and use Discord properly.

🏆 Winner: DALL·E for its simple interface based within ChatGPT.

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DALL·E vs. Midjourney on Reddit

We took to Reddit to explore the DALL·E vs. Midjourney debate, diving into various threads filled with user experiences and insights.

Some users prefer DALL·E for its user-friendly interface.

The shortcomings of DALL·E3 are worth it over the headache of Midjourney and its Discord-exclusive integration. Not even an API to work with, it’s a huge bummer. Any app I want to make would require me to make a rule-breaking Discord “self-bot” which, while unlikely, could lead to a ban. Ahhh well, DALL-E it is.

Some Reddit users think DALL·E has fewer censorship problems than Midjourney:

Midjourney certainly seems less censored at the moment, but before 6 I saw people complaining about lots of censorship issues (even the phrase Treasure Chest was causing issues due to Chest being a breasty word).

However, on the other hand, a few Reddit users contradict this:

Tried telling DALL·E to make a stock photo of overweight individuals and it refused. Like not even take these people in this image and make them overweight, but generate a new group of overweight individuals.. it’s actually more offensive that it considers a creating a photo of overweight people offensive in the first place then the potential photo.

Reddit users

Many users also believe that both tools have different capabilities.

DALL·E 3 has an affiliation with ChatGPT, which means that you can prompt it in a conversational manner, as if you’re talking to a human. Midjourney does not have a large language model attached, so you have to use very basic syntax and be super explicit when prompting it. But on the other hand, it has a lot of very specific capabilities provided by parameters that you can add to prompts, including most recently character and style reference functions,

a user

🔍 Did You Know? A team of researchers trained an AI to analyze 346 Rembrandt paintings and then generate an entirely new artwork in the Dutch master’s style. The final result, The Next Rembrandt, was a 3D-printed painting that mimicked Rembrandt’s brushstrokes.

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Meet ClickUp—The Best Alternative to DALL·E vs. Midjourney

AI-generated images are great, but what about the big picture? While tools like DALL·E and Midjourney excel at creating stunning visuals, they fall short when integrating those visuals into a streamlined workflow.

Well, ClickUp, the everything app for work, has your back. 🤩

It helps you plan, collaborate, and execute your ideas with ease. Whether you’re managing design assets, tracking feedback, or even generating AI images, ClickUp keeps everything in one place.

Let’s look at some features that might be perfect for using AI in graphic design or beyond. 🎨

ClickUp’s One Up #1: ClickUp Brain

ClickUp Brain: AI-generated task summaries and streamlined workflows
Use ClickUp Brain to create organized task summaries with clear action items

Ever feel like half your day is spent chasing down updates, searching for files, or trying to piece together scattered feedback? ClickUp Brain steps in here, acting as your virtual project manager, knowledge hub, and workflow optimizer.

The AI tool for designers connects tasks, documents, and conversations to make information instantly accessible, so you spend more time creating.

Example: Suppose you’re designing an AI-generated art project and need approvals from multiple stakeholders. Instead of sending endless follow-ups, ask Brain to generate a task summary with action items and auto-prioritize assignments based on deadlines.

It also pulls relevant documents and notes from ClickUp Docs for easy reference and drafts email follow-ups with its AI Writer.

🔍 Did You Know? AI-powered tools can restore old, damaged photographs by removing scratches and improving details. They can also accurately colorize black-and-white images based on historical references.

ClickUp’s One Up #2: ClickUp Whiteboards

Brainstorming, planning, and executing ideas should be seamless, not scattered across multiple tools.

ClickUp Whiteboards provide an interactive digital space for teams to visualize, discuss, and act on ideas in real time. Unlike traditional whiteboarding tools, Whiteboards connect directly to tasks, documents, and workflows, ensuring great ideas become action.

What sets Whiteboards apart is their AI-powered image generation. You can instantly create visuals based on text prompts while working on a marketing campaign, product design, or creative strategy—all within the Whiteboard.

ClickUp Whiteboards with an AI image generator
Generate images with ClickUp Brain within ClickUp Whiteboards

📌 Example prompt: Create a futuristic city skyline at sunset with neon lights and flying cars in a cyberpunk style.

ClickUp Brain instantly generates an image, helping the team visualize their concept without breaking the creative flow. Once finalized, they can tag relevant team members, attach tasks, and track project progress.

ClickUp Brain integrated in Whiteboards
Add sticky notes with images generated by ClickUp Brain in Whiteboards

⚙️ Bonus: Just getting started with ClickUp Whiteboards? Use the ClickUp New Whiteboard Template to kick off visual project planning.

ClickUp One Up #3: Design project management

Design teams thrive on creativity—but managing projects, feedback, and deadlines? That’s where things can get messy.

ClickUp's Design Project Management Software
Collaborate with your team using ClickUp for Design Teams

ClickUp for Design Teams is a design collaboration software that cuts through the chaos, giving creatives a single place to collaborate, track progress, and keep work flowing smoothly—no more scattered feedback or misplaced design requests.

Your team can focus on what they do best: creating. Even better, you can pair this with ClickUp for Marketing Teams to design effective marketing campaigns.

ClickUp makes it easy to see who’s working on what, so you never overload one designer while another has time to spare. Plus, with built-in tools like Whiteboards, Docs, and ClickUp Chat, you can sketch ideas, collect inspiration, and refine designs—all in real time.

Let’s say you’re designing a new website. You can create ClickUp Tasks to break down the project into manageable steps, assign responsibilities to team members, and easily track progress.

Need input from stakeholders? Add mockups to a Whiteboard, gather feedback in one place, and keep the revisions moving as you collaborate internally with Chat.

📮 ClickUp Insight: AI adoption looks different for everyone. While 28% use it regularly to streamline workflows, 27% feel they need more training to fully leverage its potential. Another 23% aren’t sure where to start, and concerns about privacy and trust hold back 11% of users.

ClickUp helps design teams integrate AI seamlessly. Whether you’re refining creative processes, generating ideas faster, or collaborating more effectively, ClickUp’s AI-powered tools provide the support, automation, and security needed to enhance creativity without the guesswork.

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The Path To Picture-Perfect Success—ClickUp

Choosing between Midjourney vs. DALL·E comes down to what fits your creative needs. Both tools offer unique features to help you generate everything from simple visuals to artistic compositions.

But why stop at image generation? ClickUp, the everything app for work, helps you manage design ideas and projects effortlessly. It allows you to track tasks, deadlines, and creative processes all in one place.

Its integrated AI assistant, ClickUp Brain, generates images, organizes ideas, brainstorms on your behalf, and stores references. Meanwhile, Whiteboards enhance collaboration and make visual planning more intuitive and effective.

Get your creative groove on and sign up to ClickUp for free today! 🧑‍🎨

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