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ULTRA-LEANGenerative AI image and video service · United States · founded 2021

Midjourney

Is Midjourney a zero-employee company? No. Midjourney is a self-funded company with dozens of employees (about 40 reported in 2023 and 60 per Forbes in April 2026), so it is an ultra-lean benchmark, not a zero-employee company.

Midjourney, Inc. is a San Francisco-based, self-described independent research lab that sells subscription access to a generative AI service that creates images and video from text prompts. The service first launched as a bot inside Discord and is now also offered through its own website.

www.midjourney.comFounded by David Holz[7],[8],[1]

Zero-Employee Score

—/ 100

Confidence
Low
Observable
25%
Insufficient evidence for a point score: only 25% of model weight is observable (minimum 60%). Evidence-supported range 10–85.

Key facts

Classification
Ultra-Lean
A small human team with exceptional AI and software leverage.
Latest supported valuation
Unknown
unknown
Revenue evidence
≥$200M revenue (2023)
stale7 Oct 2025
Founders
1
stale7 Oct 2025
Employees
~39
stale6 Sep 2023
Contractors
Unknown
Recurring contractors, where disclosed
Revenue per human
≥$5M
Annualised revenue (annual revenue) ÷ 40 founders + employees
Founder hours / week
Unknown
unknown
Last verified
16 Oct 2026
Next review 14 Jan 2027

Autonomy map

How each function is executed

Rated only where a source describes the function. Unknown is not low.

  • EngineeringHuman

    The company website (Oct 2022 capture) lists a named human 'Research and Engineering' team and was hiring AI researchers and engineers. No source describes AI agents doing engineering work.[3]

  • ProductUnknown

    No source describes how this function is executed.

  • MarketingUnknown

    No source describes how this function is executed.

  • SalesUnknown

    No source describes how this function is executed.

  • SupportUnknown

    No source describes how this function is executed.

  • FinanceUnknown

    No source describes how this function is executed.

  • LegalUnknown

    No source describes how this function is executed.

  • OperationsHuman

    Content moderation was done by people. In 2022 The Register reported 'about 40 moderators keeping an eye on the images that users create', and the website listed Discord moderators and guides by handle. Their employment status is not stated.[1],[3]

Zero-Employee Score

Score components

Computed by the same deterministic model as the calculator, using only evidenced inputs.

Score component breakdown
ComponentWeightInputScorePoints
Recurring workflow automation20%Unknown?—
Human-headcount dependence15%39 employees50.8
Founder intervention15%Unknown?—
Agent decision autonomy15%Unknown?—
Contractor dependence10%Unknown?—
Revenue per human10%$5.0M / human909.0
AI & software economics5%Unknown?—
Approval burden5%Unknown?—
Operational resilience5%Unknown?—

Operating model

How the company operates

Midjourney sells subscriptions to its image (and later video) generation service. The service launched in February 2022 as a bot inside Discord and was later offered on midjourney.com; Midjourney admitted these release facts in court. In 2022 the company described itself as 'a small, self-funded, fully-distributed team'. The Information reported that much of its revenue goes to compute and that it pays Discord a per-user revenue share.[3],[4],[7],[8]

In 2026 Midjourney began expanding beyond its core service. It announced its first acquisition, the astrology app Co-Star (deal closed in spring 2026 per Bloomberg), and said it was hiring.[14],[15]

Founder responsibilities

  • David Holz is founder and CEO. In 2022 he described running voice 'office hours' where he would 'sit on voice for four hours with like 1,000 people and just answer questions'.[2],[8]
  • Holz personally announced the company's first acquisition (Co-Star) on the Midjourney updates blog and said he would need help to build 'a broader organization around Product and Design'.[14]

Stack

AI & software stack

Infrastructure
Discord[2],[4],[7]
Engineering
JAX[3]

Timeline

  1. 2021

    Midjourney founded by David Holz (admitted in court filing).[7],[8]

  2. Feb 2022

    Image service first launched as a bot inside Discord (alleged by plaintiffs; Midjourney admitted the allegations about its releases).[7],[8]

  3. 1 Aug 2022

    Holz tells The Register the company is 'about 10 people', self-funded with no investors, and already profitable.[1]

  4. Sep 2023

    The Information reports about $200M in annual revenue with about 40 employees and no outside investors.[4],[5]

  5. 11 Jun 2025

    Disney and Universal sue Midjourney for copyright infringement; the complaint alleges $300M revenue in 2024.[6]

  6. 22 Aug 2025

    Meta announces a licensing partnership with Midjourney; Holz says Midjourney remains independent 'with no investors'.[9],[10]

  7. 4 Sep 2025

    Warner Bros. Discovery entities sue Midjourney.[7]

  8. 7 Oct 2025

    In its answer, Midjourney denies earning $300M in 2024 but admits it surpassed $200M revenue in 2023 and had nearly 21M users as of September 2024.[8]

  9. 23 Jul 2026

    Midjourney announces its first acquisition, Co-Star; Bloomberg reports the deal closed in spring 2026.[14],[15]

Provenance

Evidence table

Every observation we hold, newest first, as stated by the source. Conflicting claims are kept side by side.

Evidence table for Midjourney
DateMetricValue / claimSourceGrade
16 Oct 2026Team size“"approximately 40-45 employees"”

Sacra page, undated, with no stated basis. It appears to repeat the 2023 reporting. The value is null because the source gives a range. Undated source; date shown is when we accessed it.

Sacra [13]
16 Oct 2026Funding raised
period 2025
“Funding box: "$50.00M" (2025)”

Unsupported. Sacra's own text on the same page says Midjourney 'has not raised external funding and remains completely self-funded since its founding in 2021'. No source opened reports any funding round, so this looks like a database error. Recorded only to flag it. Undated source; date shown is when we accessed it.

Sacra [13]
13 Oct 2026Team size
period 2025
“"down from 107 a year earlier"”

Aggregator (Latka) figure with no stated basis. It conflicts with other estimates, including Sacra's undated '40-45 employees' and LinkedIn-derived counts quoted by low-quality sites, which were not opened. Recorded only because it is often repeated. Do not rely on it.

13 Oct 2026Annual revenue
period 2025
“$500M (estimate), May 2025, attributed to 'ARR Club'”

Aggregator (Latka) table entry marked as an estimate and attributed to 'ARR Club'. On the same page, Latka calls the January 2024 $200M figure (Bloomberg) 'the most recent reported figure'. No company or independent confirmation found. Treat as unverified.

16 Apr 2026Team size
period 2026-04
“Employees: 60 (as of April 2026)”

Figure from the Forbes company-profile database ('Last Updated Apr 16, 2026'). Forbes does not say whether the number came from the company or is its own estimate, and Latka calls it a 'Forbes estimate'. It predates the Co-Star acquisition: Midjourney announced the deal on 2026-07-23 and said it closed in spring 2026. One trade site says Co-Star's team of around two dozen joined Midjourney, but that site gives no source.

Forbes [11]
16 Apr 2026Annual revenue
period 2024
“"$300 million in total revenue in the 2024 fiscal year, according to PitchBook"”

Forbes company profile attributing the figure to PitchBook, a database estimate. Midjourney denied earning $300M in 2024 in its 2025-10-07 court answer.

Forbes [11]
16 Apr 2026Funding raised
period 2025-2026
“"has never taken on outside funding" (TechCrunch); "has so far shunned any outside funding" (Forbes)”

Several credible outlets state in their own voice that Midjourney has taken no outside funding: TechCrunch (2025-08-22), Forbes (profile updated 2026-04-16), and The Information (2023 headline: 'Built an AI Winner While Rejecting Venture Capital'). No funding round was found in any source opened. Absence of outside funding cannot be audited from public records, so this rests on consistent reporting plus company statements.

Forbes [11]
16 Apr 2026Profitability
period 2026
“Midjourney "is profitable" (Forbes profile)”

Statement in the Forbes company profile. No basis given.

Forbes [11]
7 Oct 2025Founders“founded in 2021 by David Holz, its Chief Executive Officer”

Paragraph 61 of the Warner Bros. complaint (filed 2025-09-04) says Midjourney 'was founded in 2021 by David Holz'. In its answer (filed 2025-10-07), Midjourney admitted that paragraph except for the $300M 2024 revenue figure. This is a judicial admission by the company, not an audited fact. No co-founder is named in any source opened.

7 Oct 2025Annual revenue
period 2023
“"surpassed $200 million in revenue in 2023" (admitted by Midjourney)”

Paragraph 61 of the Warner Bros. complaint alleges Midjourney 'surpassed $200 million in revenue in 2023'. In its answer, Midjourney 'denies that it earned $300 million in 2024' and 'admits the remaining allegations in paragraph 61'. This is a judicial admission in a federal court pleading signed by counsel. It is not audited, and it gives only a lower bound.

7 Oct 2025Users
period 2024-09
“"nearly 21 million users as of September 2024" (admitted)”

Part of paragraph 61 of the Warner Bros. complaint, which Midjourney admitted apart from the 2024 revenue figure. 'Users' is not defined. The plaintiffs' footnote cites TechCrunch and statistics sites, so the figure may count Discord community members rather than paying subscribers.

22 Aug 2025Funding raised
period 2025-08
“"We remain an independent, community-backed research lab, with no investors"”

David Holz's X post on the day Meta announced a licensing partnership with Midjourney. The deal's financial terms were not disclosed.

11 Jun 2025Annual revenue
period 2024
“"reportedly made $300 million in revenue in 2024" (plaintiffs' allegation)”

Allegation in the Disney/Universal complaint (paragraph 74; repeated in paragraph 61 of the Warner Bros. complaint). Its footnote cites TechCrunch, DemandSage (a statistics blog) and SEO.AI, not company data. Midjourney 'denies that it earned $300 million in 2024' in its 2025-10-07 answer and did not state an alternative figure. Widely repeated, but disputed by the company.

6 Sep 2023Team size
period 2023
“"$200 million in annual revenue with just 40 employees"”

Originally reported by The Information (Kate Clark; paywalled, so only the headline and byline were seen), citing 'a source close to the company' per The Decoder. Graded C rather than B because only one outlet did original reporting and it relied on an anonymous source. Recorded as total_team_size because the press figure probably counts everyone, including the founder.

6 Sep 2023Annual revenue
period 2023
“"Midjourney achieved $200 million in annual revenue" (per The Information)”

The Decoder relays The Information, which cited a source close to the company. The Decoder also reports, again citing The Information, that Midjourney 'has to pay a per-user revenue share to Discord'. The 2025 court admission above corroborates the figure.

6 Sep 2023Profitability
period 2023
“"The company is reportedly profitable, but much of its revenue goes toward more computing power."”

The Decoder relaying The Information's anonymously sourced report.

1 Oct 2022Team size
period 2022
“"We have 11 full-time staff and an incredible set of advisors."”

Company website text as captured by the Wayback Machine on 2022-10-01. The page itself is undated. The same page lists David Holz under 'Executives', eight first names under 'Research and Engineering', and two names under 'Legal and Finance' (one marked as legal advisor). It is unclear whether Holz is counted among the 11.

1 Aug 2022Team size
period 2022-08
“"We're like about 10 people"”

Founder statement made in two interviews on consecutive days: The Register (2022-08-01) and The Verge (2022-08-02, 'we're like 10 people, we have no investors'). It is unclear whether Holz is counted, so this is recorded as total_team_size and not employee_count. The Register also reports 'about 40 moderators keeping an eye on the images'. Their employment status is not stated, and the company website at the time listed 'Discord Moderators and Guides' by community handle, so they are not counted here.

1 Aug 2022Funding raised
period 2022-08
“"We're self-funded. We have no investors."”

Founder statement to The Register, repeated to The Verge ('we have no investors'). The company website (Oct 2022 capture) said: 'We are a small self-funded team'.

1 Aug 2022Profitability
period 2022-08
“"To be honest, we're already profitable, and we're fine."”

Founder statement to The Register.

Data quality

How much of this is verified

Sources
15
10 independent
Observations
20
Verified (A/B)
4
First-party (C)
8
Weak (D)
8

Unknown fields

  • Valuation
  • Contractors
  • Founder hours
  • Workflow automation share
  • Autonomy map

Verified 16 Oct 2026Next review 14 Jan 2027

Open questions

What we could not verify

  • Current headcount. Forbes lists 60 as of April 2026 without a stated basis, aggregators give 40-45 or 107, and the Co-Star team (size unverified; one trade site says 'around two dozen') joined in 2026.
  • Actual 2024 and 2025 revenue. Midjourney denied earning $300M in 2024 but gave no alternative figure, and the widely cited $500M 2025 figure is an aggregator estimate.
  • Whether the ~40 Discord moderators reported in 2022 were paid contractors, employees or volunteers.
  • The exact publication date and full contents of The Information's 2023 profile (paywalled).
  • Whether the August 2025 Meta licensing deal involved any equity or investment (terms undisclosed; Holz said there are still no investors).
  • No source describes material use of AI agents in Midjourney's internal operations; its leanness appears to come from a small human team selling a compute-heavy subscription product.
Submit a correction

Sources

Sources

  1. [1]

    The Register. Holz, founder of AI art service Midjourney, on future images

    Press interview · Published 1 Aug 2022 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    By Thomas Claburn. Quotes the founder directly (first-party content).

  2. [2]

    The Verge. An interview with David Holz, CEO of AI image-generator Midjourney: it's 'an engine for the imagination'

    Press interview · Published 2 Aug 2022 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    By James Vincent. Q&A format (first-party content). Page retrieved with curl because WebFetch is blocked for this domain.

  3. [3]

    Midjourney. Midjourney (home/about page)

    Company website · Published undated · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Read via Wayback Machine snapshot of 2022-10-01: http://web.archive.org/web/20221001135333/https://www.midjourney.com/home/ . The live site returned 403.

  4. [4]

    The Decoder. Midjourney generates $200 million in revenue and adds Web support with v6

    Independent press · Published 6 Sep 2023 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    By Matthias Bastian. Relays The Information ('which cites a source close to the company'); no independent reporting of its own.

  5. [5]

    The Information. 'He Doesn't Need VC in His Life': How Midjourney's Founder Built an AI Winner While Rejecting Venture Capital

    Independent press · Published undated · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    By Kate Clark. Paywalled: only the headline and byline were visible. The publication date is not visible but must be on or before 2023-09-06, when The Decoder cited it. Figures come from The Decoder's summary.

  6. [6]

    U.S. District Court, Central District of California (via CourtListener RECAP). Complaint, Disney Enterprises, Inc. et al. v. Midjourney, Inc., No. 2:25-cv-05275 (C.D. Cal.), Dkt. 1

    Regulatory filing · Published 11 Jun 2025 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Plaintiffs' allegations, not findings. The revenue figures in paragraph 74 cite TechCrunch, DemandSage and SEO.AI in footnote 3.

  7. [7]

    U.S. District Court, Central District of California (via CourtListener RECAP). Complaint, Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. et al. v. Midjourney, Inc., No. 2:25-cv-08376 (C.D. Cal.), Dkt. 1

    Regulatory filing · Published 4 Sep 2025 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Plaintiffs' allegations. Paragraph 61 is the one Midjourney's answer responds to (admitted except the 2024 revenue figure).

  8. [8]

    U.S. District Court, Central District of California (via CourtListener RECAP). Defendant Midjourney, Inc.'s Answer to Complaint, Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. et al. v. Midjourney, Inc., No. 2:25-cv-08376-JAK-E, Dkt. 15

    Regulatory filing · Published 7 Oct 2025 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Filed by Cooley LLP for Midjourney. Its response to paragraph 61: 'Midjourney denies that it earned $300 million in 2024. Midjourney admits the remaining allegations in paragraph 61.'

  9. [9]

    X (@DavidSHolz). David Holz post on X, 22 Aug 2025

    Social post · Published 22 Aug 2025 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Text read via the api.fxtwitter.com mirror of this post ID. The post URL was taken from TechCrunch's article.

  10. [10]

    TechCrunch. Meta partners with Midjourney on AI image and video models

    Independent press · Published 22 Aug 2025 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    By Maxwell Zeff. States that Midjourney 'has never taken on outside funding'. Its revenue reference ('on pace to generate $200 million' by 2023) cites The Information.

  11. [11]

    Forbes. Midjourney company profile

    Database · Published 16 Apr 2026 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Profile 'Last Updated Apr 16, 2026'. Lists Employees 60 (as of April 2026), $300M FY2024 revenue 'according to PitchBook', says the company 'is profitable' and 'has so far shunned any outside funding'. The basis for the headcount is not disclosed.

  12. [12]

    Latka (GetLatka). Midjourney revenue, employees (Latka company page)

    Database · Published 13 Oct 2026 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Aggregator. publishedAt is the page's 'updated' date. Mixes reported figures and estimates, and contains internal inconsistencies.

  13. [13]

    Sacra. Midjourney revenue, funding & news

    Database · Published undated · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    Undated research/aggregator page. Revenue is labelled a Sacra estimate. The '$50.00M' funding figure contradicts the page's own 'self-funded' text.

  14. [14]

    Midjourney (updates blog). Midjourney's First Acquisition

    Founder statement · Published 23 Jul 2026 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    First-person post by David Holz announcing the Co-Star acquisition. Gives no headcount or deal terms.

  15. [15]

    Bloomberg News (via Bloomberg Law). AI Lab Midjourney Buys Astrology Startup Co-Star, Plans New Apps

    Independent press · Published 24 Jul 2026 · Checked 16 Oct 2026

    By Natalie Lung. Only the opening paragraphs were visible: 'The previously unreported acquisition closed this spring, Midjourney said.' Financial terms not disclosed.