What is going on with Midjourney in 2026
Midjourney runs on version V8.2, which became the default in July 2026. You no longer need Discord: you can generate right on the site.
There is no problem with access; the problem is payment. Midjourney processes payments through Stripe, and it has two conditions:
- the card is issued outside Russia;
- the billing address matches the card’s country.
A Russian card will not go through with or without a VPN: a VPN changes your IP, not the card’s country.
Midjourney plans
| Plan | Per month | Billed annually | Through an intermediary, approximately per month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | 10 $ | 8 $ | ~1100 rubles |
| Standard | 30 $ | 24 $ | ~3400 rubles |
| Pro | 60 $ | 48 $ | ~6800 rubles |
| Mega | 120 $ | 96 $ | ~13 700 rubles |
The ruble figures are rough: say 2280 rubles per 20 dollars of subscription including the intermediary’s commission and rate. Your amount will differ; the intermediary’s calculator will show it. This is not a public offer.
There is no free plan for generation. At checkout, annual billing is often selected by default: check exactly what you are buying.
Method 1. A foreign card
A foreign bank card in your name, with a billing address in the card’s country.
Pros: you pay directly, the account is yours alone, the subscription is easy to cancel.
Cons: the card has to be issued and topped up, and you lose on conversion. If the address does not match the card’s country, the payment may not go through.
Method 2. An intermediary service
You pay the intermediary in rubles, and it pays for the subscription. The best-known options and how they work are covered in the article on how to pay for AI services from Russia.
Pros: fast, you only need a Russian card.
Cons: overpayment, you often need to hand over access to your account, and there is no protection if something goes wrong.
Tip: do not buy ready-made accounts belonging to someone else. They can be blocked, and your images will disappear with them.
Midjourney without a subscription on KADR
Since October 2026 Midjourney V8.2 is available on KADR. You do not need a foreign card, an intermediary or a monthly plan: you top up your balance in rubles with a Russian card and pay only for the requests you make.
- Each request returns 4 variants, as on the official site.
- 1K: 9 tokens for all four (about 14 rubles).
- 2K: 14 tokens (about 22 rubles).
- Tokens never expire, so a quiet month costs nothing.
This is not a public offer. If you generate in Midjourney every day and have a foreign card, the official plan may work out better; if you need it from time to time, paying per request is simpler.
The rule for companies
Midjourney has a condition that people often do not know about. If you work at a company whose annual revenue for the previous year exceeded 1 million dollars, you need the Pro or Mega plan to own the images and use them commercially. The threshold is based on the whole company’s revenue, not profit. For freelancers and small businesses any paid plan is enough.
More on who owns the rights to generated images: copyright for AI images.
When you do not need a subscription
Midjourney is good for its artistic default style: even a simple prompt produces an aesthetic picture. If you need exactly that style and generate every day, a subscription is justified. If you need it now and then, Midjourney V8.2 on KADR without a subscription is enough.
And for many tasks there are other models that do just as well and are available from Russia for rubles without a subscription:
- photorealism → Flux.2;
- photo editing and Cyrillic text in the image → Nano Banana Pro;
- complex descriptions → GPT-5 Image;
- detail in 4K → Seedream 4.5;
- logos and vector → Recraft.
A detailed comparison: Midjourney alternatives in Russia. What each model costs: how much it costs to generate an AI image.
In short
Midjourney accepts payment only by a card issued abroad with a matching billing address. From Russia, what works is a foreign card in your own name or an intermediary with a markup. There is no free plan, and companies with revenue over 1 million dollars need Pro or Mega. Without a subscription, Midjourney V8.2 is available on KADR for about 14 rubles per request with 4 variants, and if its artistic style is not critical, alternatives are available for rubles too.
