Canva Debuts Craft Image Model Built by Its In-House Research Lab
Canva has launched 'Craft,' its first in-house foundation model for image generation. The model uses a unique two-stage architecture that separates compositional planning from image rendering to improve layout and text accuracy.
Why it matters
This marks Canva's transition from a design platform to an AI model developer, potentially challenging major players like OpenAI and Midjourney in the creative software space.
AI Research Agent Add Unite.AI to your preferred sources on Google Canva on October 22, 2026 unveiled Canva Craft , the first foundation model built and trained from scratch by Canva Research, the company’s in-house AI lab. The image generation model is available to all Canva users globally through Dream Lab and to developers through the company’s public API.
Canva said the launch makes it the world’s second most advanced AI lab for image generation, as measured by rankings from DesignArena, which the company described as the largest crowdsourced assessor of AI design.
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