MiniMax vs Midjourney

Tagline

Building AGI with our mission Intelligence with Everyone

Text-to-image generation for stunning AI art

Category

Pricing

Rating

Platforms

API

Open source

Description

MiniMax is a global leader in multi-modal models and AI-native products. The company develops proprietary and open-weight large language models across text, speech, music, images, and video, providing an advanced API platform for commercial creation, agent-driven workflows, and complex task automation.

Midjourney generates high-quality images from natural language prompts, popular with designers and artists.

Key features

• Text Generation with MiniMax M2.5 & M3.1 Flash
• Video Generation with Hailuo (1080p text/image-to-video)
• Speech Synthesis (Speech 2.6/2.8 supporting 40 languages)
• Music Generation (Music 2.0/3.0 text-to-music with natural vocals)
• 5-Second Rapid Voice Cloning
• Image Generation (text-to-image with multiple sizes)
• Real-time Streaming API
• Advanced Reasoning (Chain of Thought up to 128k tokens)
• Agent-Driven Workflow & Multi-Step Planning
• Cross-Application Task Execution

• 4K temporal upscaling
• Grain and color match
• Batch API
• Timeline plugins for Premiere and Resolve

Pros

• Boasts a large global user base of over 300 million users.
• Supports ultra-high-quality speech synthesis across 40 languages with real-time response capabilities.
• Provides rapid 5-second voice cloning with multi-language support.
• Features advanced reasoning capabilities supporting Chain of Thought (CoT) up to 128k tokens.
• Generates high-definition 1080p video with robust instruction following and physics mastery through Hailuo AI Video.
• Includes versatile music generation (Music 2.0 & 3.0) supporting text-to-music with natural vocals.
• Provides open-weight options like MiniMax Music 3.0 and MiniMax H3 for flexible commercial and research applications.
• Supports low-latency real-time streaming APIs for conversational AI.

• Best-in-class aesthetic quality
• Wide range of artistic styles
• Style references via --sref
• Character references via --cref
• Fast generation on paid plans
• Active creative community
• Regular model version updates
• Built-in upscaling and variations

Cons

• Voice cloning services are restricted and require completing individual or enterprise real-name verification first.
• Individual accounts are prohibited from requesting invoices under a company name unless upgraded to enterprise authentication.
• Invoices cannot be issued directly for account top-ups; a bill must first be generated through actual consumption.
• Acquiring higher level resource guarantees is not automated and requires emailing support directly.
• Payment methods for platform top-ups are restricted to online payment and offline bank transfers.

• Requires Discord or web app
• No free trial available
• Restrictive content moderation
• Commercial rights only on paid tiers
• No official public API
• Public gallery by default on cheaper plans
• Steep prompt learning curve
• Limited fine-grained composition control

Pricing plans

• FreeUSD0
• MiniMax M3.1 Flash—
  • • Input: $0.15 / M tokens
  • • Output: $0.60 / M tokens
  • • Prompt caching Read: $0.015 / M tokens
• MiniMax-M3 (<= 512k tokens)—
  • • Permanent 50% off applied
  • • Input: $0.30 / M tokens
  • • Output: $1.20 / M tokens
  • • Prompt caching Read: $0.06 / M tokens
• MiniMax-M3 (> 512k tokens)—
  • • Permanent 50% off applied
  • • Input: $0.60 / M tokens
  • • Output: $2.40 / M tokens
  • • Prompt caching Read: $0.12 / M tokens
• MiniMax-H3—
  • • Quality first, for high-quality video creation
  • • 2K Output Video: $0.13 / second
  • • 768P Output Video: $0.08 / second
  • • Input Video: $0.04 / second
• MiniMax-H3-Highspeed—
  • • Balances quality and speed for everyday content creation
  • • 768P Output Video: $0.06 / second
  • • Input Video: $0.03 / second
• MiniMax-H3-Lite—
  • • Lower cost for creative exploration and batch generation
  • • 768P Output Video: $0.02 / second
  • • 480P Output Video: $0.025 / second
• MiniMax-H3-Max—
  • • Supports image, video, and audio references for multi-asset video creation
  • • 2K Output Video: $0.143 / second
  • • Input Video: $0.074 / second
• MiniMax-Hailuo-2.3-Fast—
  • • $0.19 per 768P, 6s video
  • • $0.32 per 768P, 10s video
  • • $0.33 per 1080P, 6s video
• MiniMax-Hailuo-2.3—
  • • $0.28 per 768P, 6s video
  • • $0.56 per 768P, 10s video
  • • $0.49 per 1080P, 6s video
• MiniMax-Hailuo-02—
  • • $0.10 per 512P, 6s video
  • • $0.15 per 512P, 10s video
• Speech RecognitionUSD0.38/usage
  • • Audio-to-text transcription with streaming
  • • Speaker diarization
  • • Subtitle (srt/vtt) export
  • • $0.38 / hour
• speech-2.8-hd—
  • • Real-time synthesis with volume/pitch/speed/mixing controls
  • • Bitrate and sample-rate options
  • • Best for short-form conversational audio
  • • $100 / M characters
• speech-2.8-turbo—
  • • Same capabilities as hd
  • • Optimized for speed and cost
  • • $60 / M characters
• Voice DesignUSD3/one_time
  • • Generate a voice from a natural-language description
  • • Usable in both sync and async T2A endpoints
  • • Preview synthesis billed at $60 / M characters
• Rapid Voice CloningUSD1.5/one_time
  • • LLM-powered voice cloning
  • • High-fidelity replica in seconds
  • • No long high-quality reference audio required

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