Catalog/ № 054
Stable Diffusion (Stability AI)
situationalThe open-weights classic — the largest community ecosystem of checkpoints and tools.
stability.aiVerified 2026-08-15
ledger entry · observed by @whysanesanders
The ecosystem is the product: ControlNet, LoRAs, ComfyUI and thousands of community checkpoints. Base SDXL/SD3 quality is behind FLUX now, but nothing matches the community tooling and tutorials.
Known limitations
- Base models aging against FLUX and newer rivals.
- Company turbulence eroded trust in the roadmap.
- Good results require picking the right community checkpoint, not the raw model.
Facts
- pricing
- freemium1
- price note
- open weights free; Brand Studio Core $50/mo; API from ~$0.03/image
- free tier
- yes
- open source
- yes
- api
- yes
- self-host
- yes
- category
- image
Sources
If we can't show the source, we don't print the number.
Same shelf — image
FLUX (Black Forest Labs)
image
Open-weights image models from the original Stable Diffusion team.
OSSAPIFREE TIER
freemiumopen weights (FLUX.2 klein, Apache-2.0); API from ~$0.014/image
Ideogram
image
Image generator with the strongest text-in-image rendering.
APIFREE TIER
freemiumfree tier (10 credits/wk); Basic $8/mo, Plus $15/mo (yearly)
Leonardo AI
image
Production-oriented image suite with fine-tuning, canvas editing and team features.
APIFREE TIER
freemiumfree tier (150 tokens/day); Essential $12/mo, Premium $30/mo