Canva launches Dream Lab, a powerful AI image generator for creatives: All about the new features

Canva has introduced a powerful new AI image generator, Dream Lab, as part of its latest update to the platform’s Visual Suite. The Australian-based design platform, known for its easy-to-use tools, unveiled the text-to-image generator along with a series of new features aimed at enhancing user experience across a wide range of creative projects.

Dream Lab, built on Leonardo.Ai’s Phoenix model, is designed to help users generate high-quality photos and graphics from text prompts. This new tool, which can produce multiple variations of an image in over 15 different styles, gives users greater flexibility, enabling the creation of everything from photorealistic portraits to 3D renders. A standout feature is the ability to upload an image as a style reference, offering granular control over the final output.

While Canva has already integrated AI-based image generation with Stable Diffusion, Dream Lab’s advanced capabilities allow users to have even more control over their content. Its context-aware AI can generate complex multi-subject images, making it an ideal addition for creatives seeking custom visuals.

Beyond Dream Lab, Canva has enhanced its Visual Suite with several new tools, many inspired by community feedback. Notably, Magic Write, Canva’s AI text generator, now includes contextual capabilities to refine text more accurately. Other key updates include new animation effects and automatic captions for videos, along with new interactive charts and advanced animation options for presentations.

Users can now also create polls and quizzes directly in Canva’s editor, and an AI-powered whiteboard with improved text sorting and summarising has been added to the suite. The Custom Mockups feature, allowing users to turn images into branded templates, further boosts Canva’s versatility.

To broaden its accessibility, Canva is expanding its Work Kits, previously aimed at businesses, to teachers, students, and small business owners, providing tailored tools and resources to support their visual content creation needs.