Ever feel that bitter disappointment of unwrapping a much-hyped gift only to find it’s not quite what you expected? That sinking sensation when reality doesn’t match the marketing? Well, buckle up, because Midjourney’s latest release might just take you on that emotional rollercoaster.
When Midjourney announced their v7 model, I waited with anticipation. After all, this is the company that changed AI art generation — the name that became synonymous with stunning, detailed, almost magical image generation. Their previous iterations set benchmarks that left competitors scrambling to catch up.
And now, v7 promised to raise that bar even higher. Better understanding of prompts. Enhanced photorealism. Improved context awareness. Text generation that actually makes sense. The promotional materials painted a picture of an AI image tool that would make even the most skilled photographers and artists do a double-take.
But does it deliver on these lofty promises?
Let’s dive into what Midjourney v7 gets right, where it falls short, and whether this highly anticipated update is actually worth your time and subscription dollars.
What is Midjourney v7?
Midjourney isn’t just another AI image generator — it’s the tool that made AI art mainstream. Since its launch in 2022, it’s transformed from an interesting experiment to the gold standard for creating stunning, realistic images from text prompts.
Midjourney v7 is their latest model, released in early April 2025 with promises of great improvements. The company claimed enhanced understanding of complex prompts, better composition, more accurate text rendering, and photorealistic quality that would blur the line between AI generation and photography.
On paper, it sounds incredible. In practice? Well, that’s where things get complicated.
Midjourney v7 Sample Outputs
Portraits
Prompt: portrait, a young woman, glamour street medium format photography, feminine, shot on cinealta, night, pastel hues
Prompt: Leica M6 and the Leica Summicron-M 40mm f/1.8, young man in his 20s looking up the sky smiling, plain white shirt, on a beautiful sunny day in a sunny day, smiling, wearing white linen, silhouette, colored, Kodak Portra 400
Okay, first thoughts: really good, all things considered.
The thing is, I just don’t think it’s an improvement. I believe it’s a sidegrade at best. One of the things I’ve always praised about Midjourney is that it’s able to create highly realistic images, but these images don’t feel right. It’s too smooth, too perfect, too… AI.
Granted, this is essentially the first iteration of their newest model. But as far as first impressions go, Midjourney 7 is leaving a bad taste.
Landscape
Prompt: a rugged coastline eroded by relentless waves, towering cliffs that’s been sculpted into dramatic arches and hidden coves, seabirds soar above, mist swirls along the horizon
Prompt: mount everest base camp, leica m6, landscape photography
Some artifacts in these images are blurring together (look closely at the tents) and not to mention that these just look fake. It’s weird — I have some issues with their previous version, but this is way worse. It’s like they took what’s working and broke it.
Movie Stills
Prompt: old 90s tv show still, three friends talking on a sofa while drinking a beer
Prompt: film still, back shot of a woman entering a bar, symmetrical, muted colors, directed by orson welles
These two images show lack of context understanding. The first one is less egregious, but you can still see that these three men are just the same character with little changes. Same hair, same jacket pattern. Not to mention that the one in the middle is missing his right leg.
My prompt for the second image specified that the woman is “entering a bar.” Problem is, she’s already there.
Product Renders
Prompt: product photography, a whiskey bottle along with a glass containing the whiskey, cottage core, beautiful lighting, earthcore, ultra-detailed
Prompt: commercial photography, a perfume bottle, pastel blue background, dreamy, soft lighting, centered, flowers to decorate the background
The first one is really good, but shadows in the second one are problematic. As far as quality, it’s on par with their last model, which isn’t good.
Mimicking Art Styles
Prompt: a sunset at the beach, vincent van gogh
One thing I’ll say about this new model: it’s better at imitating Vincent Van Gogh’s art style than its previous iteration. At least we can see some improvement in this regard.
Digital Art
Prompt: a God in his most creative and his maddest, linocut print, silver hair, blue eyes, spiraling into ecstasy, shigeo fukuda, surreal interstellar background, indigo, beautiful and colorful cosmos, minimalist
Prompt: a young woman sitting on a grassy hill at sunrise, midnight blue, gold, green, orange, pastel colors, clean line art painted by Ilya Kuvshinov, Ed Brubaker, Apollonia Saintclair, Jack Kirby, Brian Michael Bendis
Digital art is one thing that Midjourney has always done well, and I’m glad to see that the trend’s still going that way. These are great artworks that look like it’s been done by a human.
Let’s Talk About Context and Text Generation
Last month, OpenAI released their new AI image model. Apart from improved creativity, it was largely considered a success because it was (at least, in my opinion) the first model to show true understanding of context, and text generation or adding text to AI images.
Let me give you an example from GPT-4o:
Prompt: A teacher in a classroom. He’s in his 60s. He’s wearing a checkered shirt. It’s 7am. He’s writing the following on the blackboard:
“Newton’s Laws of Motion”
“One: Objects stay still or move unless influenced.”
“Two: Force equals mass times acceleration”
“Three: Every action has an equal opposite reaction.”
It’s not perfect, but considering the amount of text I wanted to include, this was as close to correct as we’re going to get from a 2025 AI model. This also shows great understanding of context since, even without specifying it, they used “Newton’s Laws of Motion” as the header.
Now, let’s try to use the same prompt in Midjourney 7.
Prompt: A teacher in a classroom. He’s in his 60s. He’s wearing a checkered shirt. It’s 7am. He’s writing the following on the blackboard:
“Newton’s Laws of Motion”
“One: Objects stay still or move unless influenced.”
“Two: Force equals mass times acceleration”
“Three: Every action has an equal opposite reaction.”
No improvement on this regard from Midjourney 7. It’s still just gibberish, like a two-year old trying to write by copying the letters.
The Bottom Line
With these results, I’m going to make a bold statement: Midjourney 7 was released as a reaction. It’s obvious that it’s not ready, and the only reason why it’s even being rolled out is because OpenAI pressured them by releasing an AI image model that’s miles ahead of any image generator we’ve seen.
What’s particularly frustrating is that Midjourney had the time (it’s been a year and a half since v6) and resources to get this right. Instead, they rushed a half-baked product to market.
Look, I’m not saying Midjourney v7 is terrible across the board. It has its moments, particularly with digital art where it continues to shine. But when a new version performs worse than its predecessor in key areas like photorealism and context understanding, we need to call it what it is: a disappointment, at least compared to OpenAI’s new model.
The AI image generation space is moving at breakneck speed, and Midjourney can’t afford to rest on their laurels — especially not when their competitors are closing the gap. OpenAI has thrown down the gauntlet, and Midjourney’s hasty response simply isn’t good enough.
Is Midjourney still one of the best AI image generators out there? Absolutely. Is v7 the revolutionary upgrade we were promised? Not even close.
