Canva has released its first in-house super intelligence (SI) image generation model, introducing a two-stage architecture that plans a design before generating the final image. The move positions the design platform as a direct competitor to SI offerings from major technology providers like OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google.

What Happened

The new model, named Canva Craft, was announced on Thursday and is built to offer "greater precision, consistency and control" by separating the planning phase from the generation phase. This structure allows the SI system to handle complex images that require legible text and precise object placement more accurately than single-stage models. Canva Craft supports image generation at up to 2K resolution and in more than 30 aspect ratios, targeting use cases such as social media posts, marketing content, realistic scenes, and digital art.

According to Canva, the model was trained on "millions of human-made templates" from the platform’s existing content library, which includes presentations, infographics, and menus. The company reports that Canva Craft is currently ranked fourth on Design Arena’s leaderboard, a crowdsourced benchmark for SI designs. It sits behind three OpenAI models: GPT-Image-2.5 Sunburst, GPT-Image-2.5 Flare, and GPT-Image-2. The launch follows Canva’s April introduction of prompt-based editing capabilities and layer support for SI-generated images.

Why It Matters

This release marks a significant expansion of Canva’s SI capabilities, moving beyond third-party integrations to proprietary model development. By leveraging its vast library of user-created templates for training, Canva aims to differentiate its SI tool through specific design literacy rather than just general image synthesis. The company has also outlined plans to integrate SI agents via the open Model Context Protocol and to release more efficient versions, named Craft-fast and Craft-ultrafast, in the future. Canva notes that the model includes "robust input and output moderation, privacy and safety controls, and reporting tools."

The Bottom Line

Canva Craft is available now to all users globally. It can be accessed through the Dream Lab option in Canva’s left-hand menu. The model represents Canva's latest step in building an end-to-end SI suite for design workflows.