Leonardo.AI Image Generator Review 2025
Leonardo.AI Image Generator AI Tools Plans & Pricing
Leonardo.AI Image Generator Comparison
Expert Review
Pros
Cons
Leonardo.AI Image Generator AI Tools's Offerings
Leonardo follows a token-based pricing system. For every image you create, you’re charged a certain number of tokens. In the free tier, you get 150 tokens daily, which is enough for basic usage since each image generation typically costs 5-8 tokens. Once you exhaust your daily limit, you need to upgrade to a paid plan. Plans start from $10 per month (if paid yearly).
Customer Support
Leonardo.ai offers several options for getting in touch with its customer support team.
The easiest way to seek support at Leonardo is via online chat. There are two aspects to it. First, you’ll be asked to interact with an AI Agent. The AI Agent, of course, is trained to answer basic questions like “How do I find X.” In most cases, the bot will direct you to relevant resources on the knowledge bank. The knowledge bank contains useful information that users frequently seek and is updated regularly. If you’re unsatisfied with the response, you can ask for manual assistance.
The other way to get support is through email. Leonardo’s support team uses Intercom to handle all the inquiries and responds to all of them in a timely manner.
Unfortunately, phone support is not available for those who prefer it.
Features & Functionality
Image Generating Features
Leonardo.ai image-generating tool has five core features. These are:
- Image Generation
- Realtime Canvas
- Canvas Editor
- Realtime Generation
- Universal Upscaler
Here’s a deeper look at the features.
Image Generation
The ability to generate a variety of images from text is core to Leonardo.ai. You can tweak the style and format and generate several variations of an image based on the same prompt, allowing you to explore different creative directions and pick the best fit. The clarity and vibrancy of the images are top-notch.
But as I found out, the magic in Leonardo.ai begins when you play around with its diverse pre-trained models. A total of 7 models cater to various artistic styles:
In my case, I chose Anime. Then, I further configured the settings to my preferences. Here are the options available:
I opted for the Anime Semi-Realism, and here were the results for the prompt “A Japanese Ninja meditating in front of a monastery:
That’s pretty accurate and realistic. It took me less than 2 minutes to generate this engaging image and use it for my projects. However, there were some issues when I tried to tweak my prompt. For example, I asked for a monk draped in a black gown in front of a Buddhist temple. This time, the results were less than desirable. In that regard, I’d say it’s still a work in progress.
But for artists who want to bring their ideas to life, Leonardo.ai is perhaps the fastest and most simplistic AI tool.
Realtime Canvas
Think of Realtime Canvas as an AI-assisted painting on a canvas. You draw art manually on one side, and the AI enhances them on the adjacent screen in real time. This enables you to create a better, more refined sketch with minimal effort. It takes a bit of a learning curve, but it is a game changer for artists, especially those who love working on canvas.
Alternatively, you can upload an image and edit it with prompts. The AI will beautify the picture for you in real time. Here’s the pic I uploaded and prompted “Ironman”:
Canvas Editor
The Canvas Editor in Leonardo.ai builds upon the foundation of the Realtime Canvas, offering a more comprehensive suite of tools for detailed image manipulation. It goes beyond basic drawing and masking and offers functionalities like selection tools, erasing, inpainting, and outpainting for precise adjustments to your AI-generated images.
The interface is quite exhaustive, and you have a lot of options to work with. I was able to refine specific aspects of my image, such as removing unwanted elements, adjusting object positions, or enhancing details. This level of control allows for a more polished and professional final output.
Realtime Generation
Realtime Generation is more like the text-to-image feature. But with this, you can see your image come to life as you type your prompt, fostering a highly interactive and iterative creative process. You can witness near-instantaneous changes to your image as you modify your text prompt. This allows for real-time experimentation and fine-tuning of your desired outcome.
Universal Upscaler
The Universal Upscaler allows you to bring your great-grandma to life. You can go from the black-and-white photo frame to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in a few clicks. The core function is to increase the resolution of an image, making it appear sharper and with more detail. This is particularly useful for low-resolution images that you want to use for printing, presentations, or other purposes where higher quality is required.
Here, I enhanced King Charles V’s pic from the 1900s with a single click:
Video Generator
There are also video-generating capabilities.
The Image2Motion tool is its video generator, which turns static images into cinematic shots. While still at the basic stage, you can certainly bring images to life. Here’s my Ninja in deep meditative action: It gives you a glimpse of what’s coming in the future.
Available on
Accessible on multiple platforms for versatile use.
Performance:
The true measure of a tool’s capability becomes apparent through hands-on experience. Therefore, I experimented with Leonardo.ai, utilizing its various models to create both images and videos. The outcomes largely met my expectations, affirming Leonardo’s promise of “Creativity Unleashed.”
The quality of the outputs from Leonardo.ai heavily depends on the chosen presets. The platform offers ten distinct presets, each tailored for different creative needs:
- Leonardo Phoenix: The foundational model suitable for a broad range of uses.
- Anime: Specifically designed for creating anime-style art.
- Cinematic Kino: Ideal for producing cinematic visuals.
- Concept Art: Used primarily for conceptual and ideational purposes.
- Graphic Design: For professional-grade graphics and artwork.
- Illustrative Albedo: Best for detailed illustrations.
- Leonardo Lightning: Focused on achieving photorealistic results.
- Lifelike Vision: Aims for hyperrealistic image quality.
- Portrait Perfect: Specialized in generating portrait images.
- Stock Photography: Tailored to create stock photos that meet industry standards.
I particularly tested the ‘Cinematic Kino’ preset with the prompt “A Bollywood actress posing in front of the Eiffel Tower.” The results were impressive, showcasing the preset’s capability to render detailed and contextually appropriate imagery.
Ease Of Use:
The standout feature of Leonardo is its user-friendly AI tool that makes creating images and videos straightforward. If you can envision it, you can likely create it with this tool.
The interface’s simplicity is immediately apparent upon login. All the tools you need are conveniently located at the top of your account page, making it easy to start creating right away. This intuitive design helps streamline the creative process, allowing users to focus more on their artistic vision and less on navigating the software.
Once you log into your account, you’re presented with all the available tools at the top:
To begin creating, simply click on one of the six options presented. I selected “Image Generation” to produce AI-generated images. The interface was straightforward, featuring all necessary settings on the left and a central prompt box, making it accessible even for those without technical expertise.
The advanced settings are also minimalist, enhancing ease of use.
The minimalist design ensures easy access to customization options without overwhelming users, a feature consistent across all of Leonardo’s AI tools.
While Gen AI is still a relatively new technology, the limited options available might still feel overwhelming for some users. To address this, Leonardo AI’s image creator prominently displays community-generated artworks on the homepage. By clicking on these images, users can view the specific prompts and settings used, offering a practical, real-world understanding of the tool’s capabilities.
This feature helps you understand which settings, resolutions, and models might work best for your needs. Like other text-to-image AI tools, the precision of images generated by Leonardo.ai hinges largely on the clarity and detail of your prompts.
The platform includes a mini-guide on crafting effective prompts, providing a useful starting point for new users to familiarize themselves with the tool’s capabilities.
Verdict:
Leonardo.ai’s core users are artists and creators who want to create realistic images with minimal effort. Its history as a gaming-focused startup has helped Leonardo maintain a lead in photorealism. You can design characters and environments and generate concept art for your projects. Powerful text-based image generation with capabilities with advanced features like Image Guidance, Negative Prompts, and Realtime Canvas lists Leonardo.ai among the top players. But there’s significant room for improvement in the video generation space. With Leonardo.ai pricing on the affordable side, design-focused creators should surely give Leonardo.ai a try.
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