* Civitai response with clarifications about statistics and metrics is included at the end of the article.
Early Access (EA) was introduced as part of the Creators Program, as a way for creators to be compensated for their models. EA allows creators to publish a new model in "Early Access" state - with a certain price in Buzz the creator decides on, with up to 20 models, for up to 15 days (i.e., ~2 weeks). Users are able to access the model only after paying the specified Buzz. Creators can extract the Buzz at the end of the month. $0.52 for 1000 Buzz was the extraction rate in May.
If we ignore the practical 48% fee, the main problem with the current Early Access is the duration of 2 weeks. Currently, on average, users discover that a model is in EA when it only has 7 days left until public release. Usually, it takes people a few extra days to actually use the model - on weekends and such, so even when a user is interested in the model, they donāt need to wait long to get it for free, at most just a few days. With the current short EA, the system minimizes the chance of users paying for EA and basically sabotages the chances of creators being compensated. Whatās the point for users to pay if they will get the model for free in a couple of days?!
The two-week period of EA was always too short and was only a viable solution if Civitai had a lot of users eager to pay easily - which is not the case. Itās very difficult for creators to convince people to pay, even when users are interested. And Civitai makes it very hard for creators to actually make a profit from their models. Additionally, by giving an excessive 25% share of Buzz to model generation on Civitai that isnāt covered by real money, the value of Buzz dropped to around 50% during the May payment to creators. Therefore, compensation from EA is also reduced by 50% due to artificial Buzz devaluation.
The short Early Access duration is especially problematic for trained checkpoints that take days or even weeks of work - dataset creation, training, integration, polishing, and extra iterations. The top 1% of very popular models might get some decent compensation with just 2 weeks, but thatās not a reasonable timeframe for most models. There is a long tail of interests that creators provide on Civitai, and with fewer people interested in niche topics, the only way to support those relatively small groups of interest is to allow enough time for people to discover them and enough time to make Early Access worth it for most of the creators.
Unfortunately, the current system is only beneficial to Civitai itself, and maybe a few very popular creators, while most creators are discouraged and not allowed to be compensated.
Civitai has two big groups of users: those who are using models on the site, and those who are using resources on their own PCs/servers. Early Access is the only way to support creators targeting local users, who, as far as I know, make up 90% of the users on the site. Early Access requires very little from Civitai, unlike generation, while longer EA benefits everyone:
Creators can work longer on each model and create better models - even smaller creators.
Civitai gets to charge a fee (50% in May) for hosting and platform maintenance for longer, without wasting much GPU power.
All users get more and better models.
Paying users get access immediately - and are rewarded exclusively for longer.
Non-paying users still get models eventually.
Iām not asking for handouts or to exploit anyone. Iām asking for Civitai to be more fair to creators - to let creators earn from their work - if users are willing to support them. Two weeks isnāt enough. A reasonable, longer EA wouldnāt hurt anyone. It would only make Civitai better for most creators, help more creators be compensated for their work, and help users get more and better models.
I understand Civitai doesnāt want to upset users, but the current situation is clearly unfair, as free riders get everything quickly while creators are basically taken advantage of without alternatives. Reasonable users understand that creators need to be compensated for their models - time, effort, and skills. Users who are happy to support creators will continue to get what they pay for in EA, and they are not going to oppose a longer EA. Civitai is currently appeasing only those who don't want to pay at all - not to creators, not to Civitai. These people often try to demoralize creators when creators invest more time into the development of original models, which requires more time and effort, and would not be created without fair compensation.
Civitai is the main player and de facto monopoly for independent Stable Diffusion models in a free world (and not under Chinese control). Thereās nothing wrong with that - it took effort and risk to get to this point - but it comes with responsibility. Civitai has power, and it should continue to help the community and the SD ecosystem. A longer EA is a fair and simple change that would be understood and supported by anyone who wants the community to keep thriving.
The two-week EA was always meant to be a first step on the path to more meaningful rewarding of creators. A longer EA was brought up many times and promised by Civitai. Yet it hasn't been implemented yet, likely from fear of backlash from a very few toxic users. But Civitai should be courageous and do the right thing.
In the last few weeks, Civitai has gone through significant changes in policies and financial obstacles that can be devastating to Civitai's future and the Creators Program as well. I hope that Civitai will find a way to achieve financial sustainability as soon as possible. And to a certain degree, it's already succeeding with alternative routes. All the changes only make compensation from Early Access more difficult to achieve for creators, and it only strengthens the fundamental need of my request for longer EA. Instability and lower revenues require longer EA.
This isnāt about me personally. But I know that Iāll be attacked personally, and there will be a few people who will try to humiliate and demoralize me and my models. Thatās fine. If those people donāt like my work, Iām fine with that. If they donāt respect creators or think creators don't deserve to be paid for their work, they should not use models by people they don't respect. They can make their own models.
There is an argument from a few people that is repeated in every discussion of compensating creators. Some people jump on a claim that all models are ātheftā and profiting from them is immoral. Those people are very hypocritical, in my opinion - they are happy to enjoy the poisoned fruits of "theft" - they will mention artists, but they don't want to pay artists or anyone. I donāt think making models is theft. It requires work, time, knowledge, and originality. If some people donāt see value in my models, they donāt have to use them. If they donāt see value in a creatorās models in Early Access, they should ignore them - the price and duration of Early Access should not matter to them. They can go and pay for MidJourney.
Nobody is forced to use Early Access. And most creators and users will not use it - and that's 100% okay. But some creators want to use EA, and many users are happy to support creators they like. If some users donāt value a model, it doesn't matter how long EA is - they should not demand to use it anyway. But most people who value models that took creators time and effort to make should understand that those models would not exist without creators, and without creators getting enough support to be able to continue making cool models. That's why Early Access should allow fair compensation to creators - and 2 weeks doesnāt do justice to that, not even close.
To anyone who might oppose the change, I would like to say: if thereās a creator you like, and there are models they made that youāve enjoyed - wouldnāt you want them to be compensated fairly so they can make more models like those you like?! Even if you canāt support them yourselves now, letting other people support creators you like - it helps you get models you love, it helps creators you like continue making models, it helps Civitai grow, it helps the community evolve in a healthy, merit-based manner.
What should the new EA duration be?
Given how hard it is to earn anything with EA, I would suggest for EA to be changed to at least 45-60 days. With 60 days, users will be able to discover more models they like, while on average the model still has 30 days until its public release. Paying users will get their early access - like before. They will feel good for supporting creators and getting the model for a significant time before free riders. 60 days will also make much more sense for checkpoint development, which takes longer to make and requires more effort and resources. Longer EA would help many niche creators get support, especially in a time of instability we are experiencing now. The limit of only 20 models in EA should be extended and extrapolated according to the extended EA duration.
Footnote regarding Buzz value:
Currently there is a 25% compensation for content generation on site - which is not backed by real money Civitai can share with creators. That's why in May, the extraction rate was $0.52 for 1000 Buzz, which is very far from the original paid value of $1 = 1000 Buzz by users. It's important to understand that the percent shared with creators doesn't change the relative portion of every creator from the creators' compensation pool. Civitai can give everyone 1000% Buzz compensation - and devalue Buzz further - or it can lower it to 5% - every creator's compensation portion from the compensation pool for images generated on site will be the same. With high Buzz reward, the value of Buzz goes down on extraction - which damages Early Access, bounties, and tips - basically all direct transactions of Buzz that are unrelated to on-site generated images. By lowering the compensation percent for on-site images, the value of Buzz will go back up to a reasonable value of Buzz on extraction - 85% or higher from Buzz's initial value. There is no reason to give people high rewards that devalue Buzz and harm people who are not using on-site generation.
My other articles on related topics:
* Civitai still not profitable unfortunately, and losing money every month.
Civitai response with clarifications about statistics and metrics:
May 2025 numbers (rounded):
ā¢ Buzz bought for cash: ā 594 M
ā¢ Buzz paid forward to creators for on-site generation: ā 73 M
ā¢ Buzz earned specifically from Early Access sales: ā 17 M
ā¢ Active generators: ā 320 k unique users
ā¢ Model downloaders: ā 482 k unique users
ā¢ Total monthly active users: ā 2 M
As well as a few clarifications:
The 25% on-site generation reward is covered by real money as itās directly linked to people paying for generation. We are modelling how different reward levels affect Buzz price, EA earnings, and overall engagement.