UserOnboarding.ai
Onboarding for AI productsCreativemidjourney.com ↗

Midjourney

A case study in onboarding through someone else's platform: through 2023 new users signed in on midjourney.com, authorized a Discord bot, joined the Discord server, passed captchas and Discord's own community onboarding, then added the bot to a server before generating anything. The 2024 web app replaced this with an Explore feed of community images and an "Imagine…" prompt bar, initially gated behind prior Discord usage.

Discord OAuth screen asking the user to authorize Midjourney Bot's permissions
Discord OAuth screen asking the user to authorize Midjourney Bot's permissions · Faqprime · 2023-07
Web dashboard empty state: "Join the Discord to start creating!"
Web dashboard empty state: "Join the Discord to start creating!" · Faqprime · 2023-07
Inside the Midjourney Discord server: "You must complete Onboarding to view this community" with a Start Onboarding button
Inside the Midjourney Discord server: "You must complete Onboarding to view this community" with a Start Onboarding button · Faqprime · 2023-07
Adding Midjourney Bot to the user's own Discord server (server select step)
Adding Midjourney Bot to the user's own Discord server (server select step) · Faqprime · 2023-07
Midjourney web alpha: Explore feed with "Imagine…" bar, Search prompts, and Random/Hot/Top Day/Likes tabs
Midjourney web alpha: Explore feed with "Imagine…" bar, Search prompts, and Random/Hot/Top Day/Likes tabs · Sydney Butler, How-To Geek · 2024-05

Notes

  • Faqprime's 2023 walkthrough counts 13 screens from landing page to "All set!": Sign In → Discord OAuth "Authorize" (Midjourney Bot requests username, email, server joins, etc.) → "Join the Discord to start creating!" → Accept Invite → captcha → Discord's "Start Onboarding" gate → find Midjourney Bot → Add to Server → select server → Continue → authorize → second captcha.
  • The pre-Discord web dashboard's empty state was just a "Join the Discord to start creating!" link and "When you generate an image, it will appear here" — the website could not create, only display.
  • Two separate captcha checks and a Discord-native "You must complete Onboarding to view this community" gate sit between sign-in and the first prompt.
  • How-To Geek (May 19, 2024) reports the new web interface was first limited to users who had generated 1,000 images on Discord, then "lowered way down to only 100 images" — access to the easier onboarding was earned through the harder one.
  • The web alpha opens on Explore (Random / Hot / Top Day / Likes tabs, a Randomize button, and a "Search prompts" box) with the "Imagine…" bar pinned at the top, so the first screen is a gallery of what's possible plus the input to try it; sidebar also offers Rate Images and Rate Ideas.
  • Per How-To Geek, generation settings (size, aesthetics, model) hide behind the sliders icon next to the prompt rather than being asked up front.

Patterns

third-party platform onboardingOAuth authorizecaptchacommunity gallery as homeusage-gated accessempty state with next step

Articles

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