Midjourney Beginner's Guide: Create Your First AI Image in 15 Minutes

What Is Midjourney?

Midjourney is an AI image generator that creates stunning visual art from text descriptions. You describe what you want to see — in plain language — and Midjourney produces high-quality images within seconds.

Since its launch, Midjourney has become the gold standard for AI image generation, used by designers, artists, marketers, game developers, architects, and anyone who needs custom visuals without the skills or budget for traditional graphic design.

What makes Midjourney stand out:

• Exceptional artistic quality — results look genuinely professional
• Handles a huge range of styles (photorealistic, illustrated, cinematic, abstract)
• Active community of prompt-sharers for learning and inspiration
• Continuously improving with regular model updates

How Midjourney Works

Midjourney runs primarily through Discord — a popular chat platform. You interact with the Midjourney bot through Discord channels or direct messages, and it generates your images there.

Midjourney also has a web interface at midjourney.com, which is becoming the primary interface (and is faster to use), but the Discord-based workflow is still widely used and important to understand.

Step 1: Create Accounts

Get a Discord Account

If you do not have Discord, go to discord.com and sign up for a free account. This takes about two minutes — just an email address and password.

Download the Discord app (desktop app is recommended for ease of use), or use it in your browser.

Subscribe to Midjourney

Go to midjourney.com and click Sign In. Log in with your Discord account. Once logged in, click Subscribe to choose a plan:

For beginners, Standard is the sweet spot — you get enough images to learn and experiment without running out constantly.

Note: Midjourney no longer offers a free trial for new accounts.

Step 2: Join the Midjourney Discord Server

After subscribing, go to discord.gg/midjourney to join the official Midjourney Discord server. Once inside, you can use Midjourney in the community channels or, better, in your own private server.

Setting Up Your Own Server (Recommended)

1. In Discord, click the + icon in the left sidebar to create a new server
2. Select "Create My Own" → "For me and my friends"
3. Name it anything (e.g., "My AI Images")
4. In your new server, click + Add App or go to the Discord App Directory
5. Search for "Midjourney Bot" and add it to your server

Having your own server keeps your images private and organized, away from the busy public channels.

Step 3: Generate Your First Image

In any channel where the Midjourney Bot is active, type:

/imagine prompt: a golden retriever puppy playing in autumn leaves, warm sunlight, photorealistic, professional photography

The /imagine command tells the bot you want to create an image. Press Enter to submit.

Within 30–60 seconds, Midjourney will generate 4 image variations based on your prompt. Each set of four images is called a grid.

Understanding the Buttons Under Your Images

After your grid appears, you will see two rows of buttons:

U1, U2, U3, U4 — Upscale. Click these to enlarge and enhance one of the four images. U1 is top-left, U2 is top-right, U3 is bottom-left, U4 is bottom-right.

V1, V2, V3, V4 — Variation. Click these to generate 4 new images that are variations of that specific image — similar style and composition, but different details.

🔄 Re-roll — Generate a completely new set of 4 images using the same prompt.

Typical workflow: Generate a grid → Identify the best one → Upscale it → If not satisfied, create variations of it → Upscale the best variation.

Writing Your First Prompts

The quality of your images depends heavily on your prompt. Here is what goes into a good Midjourney prompt:

The Basic Formula

[Subject] + [Environment/Setting] + [Style/Aesthetic] + [Lighting] + [Technical parameters]

Example:

a futuristic city skyline at dusk, cyberpunk aesthetic, neon lights reflecting in rain-soaked streets, dramatic low angle shot, cinematic --ar 16:9 --v 6

Breaking it down:

• Subject: a futuristic city skyline
• Setting/time: at dusk
• Style: cyberpunk aesthetic
• Details: neon lights reflecting in rain-soaked streets
• Composition: dramatic low angle shot
• Technical tag: cinematic
• Parameters: --ar 16:9 (aspect ratio), --v 6 (model version)

Key Parameters to Know

--ar [width]:[height] — Aspect ratio

• --ar 1:1 — Square (Instagram posts)
• --ar 16:9 — Widescreen (presentations, YouTube thumbnails)
• --ar 9:16 — Portrait/vertical (mobile, stories)
• --ar 4:3 — Traditional photo format

--v [number] — Model version (always use the highest number available for best quality, e.g., --v 6.1)

--style raw — Less artistic interpretation, more literal to your prompt (useful for photorealistic images)

--q [0.25, 0.5, 1, 2] — Quality (higher = more detail, more GPU time used)

--no [things] — Exclude elements from the image (--no text, watermarks, blurry)

Styles That Work Well With Midjourney

One of Midjourney's strengths is handling a wide range of visual styles. Here are some that produce consistently great results:

Photorealistic: "professional photography, natural lighting, Canon EOS R5, shallow depth of field"

Cinematic: "cinematic still, film grain, dramatic lighting, movie poster composition, 35mm film"

Illustration: "flat design illustration, clean lines, minimal color palette, vector art style"

Oil Painting: "oil painting, impressionist style, textured brushstrokes, museum quality"

Concept Art: "concept art, detailed, professional illustration, artstation style"

Minimalist: "minimalist design, white background, simple shapes, clean composition"

Common Beginner Mistakes

Too short a prompt: "a dog" will produce something, but it will be generic. Be specific about what kind of dog, in what setting, in what style.

Contradictory descriptions: "A bright, moody, dark, vibrant image" confuses the model. Pick a clear direction.

Forgetting aspect ratio: The default is square. For most real-world uses (website images, social media), you will want to specify --ar.

Not iterating: The first grid is rarely the final image. Use V buttons to explore variations of promising results before upscaling.

Skipping the style: Adding a style or aesthetic ("watercolor," "cinematic," "editorial photography") dramatically improves the coherence and quality of results.

Finding Inspiration and Learning From Others

The Midjourney Discord's showcase channels and the midjourney.com gallery are goldmines for prompt learning. When you see an image you love:

1. Click on it to see the prompt that generated it
2. Copy and modify the prompt to suit your needs
3. Note which style keywords and parameters were used

Learning from others' prompts is the fastest way to improve your own results.

Next Steps

Once you are comfortable generating basic images, move on to learning about Midjourney's parameters and advanced prompting techniques — they are what separate beginner results from professional-quality outputs.