Overall Winner: Midjourney·85/ 100

Lightricks vs Midjourney

In-depth comparison — valuation, funding, investors, founders & more

L
Lightricks

🇮🇱 Israel · Zeev Farbman

Series DAI ImageEst. 2013

Valuation

$1.8B

Total Funding

$335M

83
Awaira Score83/100

500-1000 employees

Full Lightricks Profile →
Winner
M
Midjourney

🇺🇸 United States · David Holz

BootstrappedAI ImageEst. 2021

Valuation

$10B

Total Funding

N/A

85
Awaira Score85/100

100 employees

Full Midjourney Profile →
🔬

Analyst Summary

Generated from real data · No AI hallucinations

Both Lightricks and Midjourney compete directly in the AI Image space, making this a head-to-head matchup within the same market segment. Lightricks builds AI-powered creative tools for photo and video editing, producing mobile and desktop applications including Facetune, Videoleap, Photoleap, and LTX Studio that serve professional creators, social media influencers, and consumer users with AI-powered editing, enhancement, and generation features. Midjourney is an independent AI image generation company founded in 2021 and currently valued at $10.

Midjourney carries a valuation of $10B, which is 5.6x higher than Lightricks's $1.8B. Lightricks has raised $335M in disclosed funding.

Lightricks has 8 years more market experience, having been founded in 2013 compared to Midjourney's 2021 founding. In terms of growth stage, Lightricks is at Series D while Midjourney is at Bootstrapped — a meaningful difference for investors evaluating risk and upside.

Lightricks operates out of 🇮🇱 Israel while Midjourney is based in 🇺🇸 United States, giving each a distinct home-market advantage. On Awaira's 0–100 composite score, both companies are closely matched — Lightricks scores 83 and Midjourney scores 85.

Metrics Comparison

MetricLightricksMidjourney
💰Valuation
$1.8B
$10BWINS
📈Total Funding
$335MWINS
N/A
📅Founded
2013
2021WINS
🚀Stage
Series D
Bootstrapped
👥Employees
500-1000
100
🌍Country
Israel
United States
🏷️Category
AI Image
AI Image
Awaira Score
83
85WINS

Key Differences

💰

Valuation gap: Midjourney is valued 5.6x higher ($10B vs $1.8B)

📅

Market experience: Lightricks has 8 years more (founded 2013 vs 2021)

🚀

Growth stage: Lightricks is at Series D vs Midjourney at Bootstrapped

👥

Team size: Lightricks has 500-1000 employees vs Midjourney's 100

🌍

Market base: 🇮🇱 Lightricks (Israel) vs 🇺🇸 Midjourney (United States)

⚔️

Direct competitors: Both operate in the AI Image market segment

Awaira Score: Midjourney scores 85/100 vs Lightricks's 83/100

Which Should You Choose?

Use these signals to make the right call

L

Choose Lightricks if…

  • Stronger investor backing — raised $335M
  • More market experience — founded in 2013
  • Israel-based for regional compliance or proximity
  • Lightricks builds AI-powered creative tools for photo and video editing, producing mobile and desktop applications including Facetune, Videoleap, Photoleap, and LTX Studio that serve professional creators, social media influencers, and consumer users with AI-powered editing, enhancement, and generation features
M

Choose Midjourney if…

Top Pick
  • Higher Awaira Score — 85/100 vs 83/100
  • More established by valuation ($10B)
  • United States-based for regional compliance or proximity
  • Midjourney is an independent AI image generation company founded in 2021 and currently valued at $10

FAQ — Lightricks vs Midjourney

Is Lightricks bigger than Midjourney?
By valuation, Midjourney is the larger company at $10B versus $1.8B — a 5.6x difference. Size can also be measured by team: Lightricks employs 500-1000 people while Midjourney has 100 employees.
Which company raised more funding — Lightricks or Midjourney?
Lightricks has raised $335M in disclosed funding across 0 known rounds. Midjourney's funding history is not publicly available.
Which company has a higher Awaira Score?
Midjourney holds the higher Awaira Score at 85/100, compared to Lightricks's 83/100. The Awaira Score is a composite metric factoring in valuation, funding, stage, team size, and market presence — a 2-point gap that reflects meaningful differences in scale or traction.
Who founded Lightricks vs Midjourney?
Lightricks was founded by Zeev Farbman in 2013. Midjourney was founded by David Holz in 2021. Visit each company's profile on Awaira for a full founder biography.
What does Lightricks do vs Midjourney?
Lightricks: Lightricks builds AI-powered creative tools for photo and video editing, producing mobile and desktop applications including Facetune, Videoleap, Photoleap, and LTX Studio that serve professional creators, social media influencers, and consumer users with AI-powered editing, enhancement, and generation features. The Jerusalem company has built one of the largest consumer AI creative app portfolios globally by download volume, with its applications generating hundreds of millions of downloads across the App Store and Google Play.\n\nThe company raised approximately $335 million including a Series D from investors including Goldman Sachs, Insight Partners, and Greycroft, reaching a valuation of $1.8 billion. Lightricks reports hundreds of millions of registered users across its app portfolio and generates substantial subscription revenue through premium tiers across Facetune and Videoleap. The company has invested heavily in generative AI capabilities including text-to-image and text-to-video features built into its mobile applications, positioning the portfolio for continued relevance in the AI creative tools market.\n\nLightricks competes in the mobile creative AI market against Adobe Lightroom, Canva, and Snap, as well as against dedicated AI creative tools including Midjourney and Runway. Its strength in the mobile consumer segment, where it has established distribution and high review ratings, differentiates it from professional desktop AI creative tools. The Israel engineering talent pool, particularly in computer vision and computational photography, has been a key resource for building the technical depth in image processing that underlies the Lightricks application portfolio. Midjourney: Midjourney is an independent AI image generation company founded in 2021 and currently valued at $10.0B. The company operates as a bootstrapped entity, declining external venture capital funding while achieving significant scale and valuation. Midjourney develops a text-to-image AI model that converts natural language prompts into detailed visual content, accessible primarily through a Discord-based interface. The platform utilizes proprietary deep learning algorithms trained on vast image datasets to generate images across diverse styles, subjects, and artistic directions. Users interact with the service through a subscription model offering varying tiers of monthly image generation credits. The company competes directly with OpenAI's DALL-E, Stability AI's Stable Diffusion, and Google's Imagen in the generative image space. Midjourney has gained substantial adoption among designers, artists, creative professionals, and enterprises seeking rapid visual prototyping and content generation. The platform has demonstrated particular strength in producing aesthetically refined outputs and supporting iterative refinement through in-painting and style customization features. The company has expanded its user base substantially through word-of-mouth adoption and community engagement. Midjourney's bootstrapped approach distinguishes it within a heavily venture-funded sector, enabling independent product decisions and business strategy prioritization. Midjourney achieved $10B valuation without external funding, relying entirely on subscription revenue while competing against well-capitalized AI imaging competitors.
Which company was founded first?
Lightricks was founded first in 2013, giving it 8 years of additional market experience. Midjourney was founded later in 2021. In AI, even a year or two of head start can translate into significantly more training data, customer relationships, and institutional knowledge.
Which company has more employees?
Lightricks has approximately 500-1000 employees, while Midjourney has approximately 100. A larger team often signals higher revenue or venture backing, but in AI, smaller teams are increasingly capable of building at scale.
Are Lightricks and Midjourney competitors?
Yes, Lightricks and Midjourney are direct competitors — both operate in the AI Image space and likely target overlapping customer segments. This comparison is especially relevant for buyers evaluating both platforms.