Canva boosts AI and workplace tools

All-in-one graphics tool Canva unveiled a suite of new products and features. The announcement coincides with Canva reaching the 200 million monthly active user milestone, an increase of more than 115 million over the last two years, as the company also hits $2.5 billion in annualized revenue. The company, which is planning an IPO, had to walk back a controversial price increase recently. The new features are largely powered by generative AI technology from Leonardo.ai, which was recently acquired by Canva.

“We’re incredibly excited to now be empowering more than 200 million people in nearly every country across the globe. From over 95% of the Fortune 500 to millions of small businesses, classrooms and nonprofits, it’s certainly an exciting milestone but we feel we’re still just 1% of the way there,” said Melanie Perkins, Canva’s Co-Founder and CEO. “As we double down on empowering everyone to turn their ideas into designs, we’re introducing dozens of new features across our Visual Suite at the intersection of creativity and productivity. From more interactive designs to a suite of AI-powered upgrades, we hope these new features help our community to continue achieving their goals.”

Canva introduced Dream Lab, a generative AI tool designed to transform ideas from a simple text description into dynamic and highly dynamic photos and graphics. Powered by Leonardo’s advanced Phoenix foundational model, Dream Lab will:

• Generate multiple variations in more than 15 different styles including 3D Renders and illustrations
• Use an existing image as a style reference to more precisely influence the output, unlocking possibilities like generating stock photos in your company’s style
• Create complex multi-subject images and photorealistic portraits

Dream Lab enhances the precision of outputs from Canva’s user-friendly Magic Studio. At the same time, Canva is reaffirming its commitment to safe and responsible AI use by ensuring Dream Lab is backed by Canva Shield, the company’s rigorous and industry-leading approach to AI trust and safety, the company claims.

Other enhancements announced by Canva include:

• Smarter Whiteboards: AI-powered sorting and summarising, along with interactive ‘Reaction Stickies’ to help teammates vote on ideas in real time.
• More Intuitive Magic Write: New AI functionalities including contextual text generation for more accurate output and one-click commands to refine generated text.
• Effortless Video Capabilities: Advanced animation effects and automatically generated captions that can be matched to brand style to save hours of manual work.
• More Interactive Presentations: New interactive chart types and advanced animation effects to boost engagement. Plus, automatic page numbers added with one click.
• Expanded Data Storytelling: The introduction of new chart types such as Area Charts, Radar Charts, Hierarchy Charts, and Statistical Charts.
• Introducing Custom Mockups: Turn photos into professional, on-brand mockup templates in a click.
• Debuting Polls and quizzes: Create simple, customizable polls and quizzes directly in the editor.
• Powerful Integrations: Access and collaborate on Canva designs directly within Google Workspace via Gmail, Google Drive, Calendar, Docs and more.
• Artlist integration: Through the Artlist Premium Video Library, Canva now offers music and cinematic video assets from top industry artists.
• Enhancing inclusive representation with pocstock: Canva strengthens its commitment to diversity by introducing the pocstock content collection. This partnership gives paid users access to 150,000 photos, empowering them to create content that better reflects an inclusive world.