8 TermsPlain EnglishUpdated 2026

AI Image Glossary

Plain-English definitions of the technical terms that come up when you read AI image documentation, blog posts and prompt guides.

LoRA

Low-Rank Adaptation

A LoRA is a small add-on file (usually 50-200 MB) that teaches a base AI image model a specific style, character or visual concept without retraining the whole model. The base mode…

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ControlNet

Conditioning Network

ControlNet is an add-on architecture that lets you constrain an AI image generation to a specific pose, depth map, edge map or composition. Instead of relying on the prompt alone, …

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Diffusion Model

The architecture behind modern AI image generators

A diffusion model generates an image by starting from pure noise and gradually denoising it over many small steps until a coherent image emerges. The model learns this denoising pr…

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CFG Scale

Classifier-Free Guidance

CFG Scale controls how strictly an AI image model follows your prompt versus how much creative freedom it takes. Low values (1-4) produce loose, dreamlike results that may ignore p…

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Negative Prompt

What you want the model to avoid

A negative prompt is a separate text field where you list things the model should NOT include in the image. Useful for avoiding watermarks, extra fingers, blurry artifacts and unwa…

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Inpainting

Editing a specific region of an existing image

Inpainting lets you mask a specific area of an image and have the AI regenerate only that area while keeping the rest untouched. The classic use cases are removing an unwanted obje…

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Image-to-Image

Using an existing image as a starting point

Image-to-Image (often shortened to img2img) starts the diffusion process from an existing image instead of pure noise. The model preserves the rough composition and colors of the i…

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Seed

The random starting point of a generation

A seed is the random number that determines the initial noise pattern a diffusion model starts denoising. Using the same seed with the same prompt and the same model produces an al…

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All AI Image Models in One Place

Compare 14 official AI image generators — new models added monthly.