Z.ai’s open source GLM-Image beats Google’s Nano Banana Pro at complex text rendering, but not aesthetics
Open Source Rivals Have Not Been Far Behind
This week, we got a new open source alternative to Nano Banana Pro in the category of precise, text-heavy image generators: GLM-Image, a new 16-billion parameter open-source model from recently public Chinese startup Z.ai. By abandoning the industry-standard “pure diffusion” architecture that powers most leading image generator models in favor of a hybrid auto-regressive (AR) + diffusion design, GLM-Image has achieved what was previously thought to be the domain of closed, proprietary models: state-of-the-art performance in generating text-heavy, information-dense visuals like infographics, slides, and technical diagrams.
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