How to Make Money with Stable Diffusion: Eight Local Paths

Stable Diffusion is a family of open image models you can run on your own machine. Nobody pays you for generating pictures. People pay for a product that uses those weights: a phone app, a host for custom checkpoints, an installer, or one narrow job the general models do badly.

This is a local-first list. Midjourney as a hosted cousin is in how to make money with Midjourney. Node graphs built on the same weights are in how to make money with ComfyUI. Every number below is copied from the stack, with its proof label. The median verified AI business here makes about $300 a month (study).

1. An upscaler built on open Stable Diffusion weights

Stack: AI image upscaler SaaS built on open-source Stable Diffusion

Magnific enlarges an image and rebuilds detail with open Stable Diffusion weights rather than a closed image API. The stack says the founders rented GPUs to serve customers, and that you can build the same pipeline on your own GPU. $10.2M revenue in 2024 (2 people, ~90% gross margin after GPU costs), posted by Javi López on X, Apr 28, 2026. Verified. Local, Hard, 90% automated. The stack’s income section also calls that dollar figure founder-reported. The proof label on the stack is still Verified.

Honest catch: the stack also says Freepik acquired the product in May 2024. GPU bills are part of the story. Two people and a year like that is an outlier with an audience, not a weekend preset. The site marks the stack local because the weights are open and the pipeline can run on your GPU. The customers were served from rented machines.

2. Run Stable Diffusion on the buyer’s iPhone

Stack: On-Device AI Image Generator Phone App

PhoneDiffusion runs Stable Diffusion on the iPhone, so images stay private and there is no GPU bill. TrustMRR (RevenueCat, Oct 22, 2026) shows $877 MRR, $3,230 last 30 days, $9,478 all-time. Verified. The stored income line is $0–$3K+. Local, Hard, 90% automated. Startup cost $99 (Apple Developer Program).

Honest catch: on-device quality trails hosted image tools. You have to ship real software. Artist communities push back on AI art; licenses and likeness still matter.

3. Host other people’s custom Stable Diffusion models

Stack: Run-Your-Custom-Model Stable Diffusion Site

sphuff launched stadio.ai so hobbyists could upload their own checkpoints and LoRAs. On Hacker News (Jan 22, 2023) they reported $700 MRR, about seven weeks after a December 2022 launch. The stored line is $0–$700 MRR (example, about 7 weeks after launch). Operator-Reported. Local, Hard, 90% automated.

A nearby host for ComfyUI graphs is ComfyUI Workflow Hosting / API Platform at $0–$29K MRR (example, founder-reported). Operator-Reported. Local. Compare the two on Custom SD Hosting vs ComfyUI Hosting.

Honest catch: the $700 figure is from early 2023, with no later update in the source. Civitai and other hosts now compete for the same hobbyists. You moderate uploads (NSFW, likeness, copyright) and you pay for GPUs.

4. One job: a photo into a coloring page

Stack: Photo-to-Coloring-Page Generator

DreamAndColor turns a family photo into a printable coloring page. It started on Stable Diffusion 1.5. The founder posted it in a thread for projects making $500+/mo and said it grows 10–20% a month; no dollar figure is disclosed. Operator-Reported. Local, Medium, 90% automated.

Honest catch: “posted in a $500+/mo thread” is not the same as a disclosed month. Parents reject pages where the face is wrong. You still tune styles.

5. A local plugin for one art style

Stack: Local AI Plugin for a Niche Creative App

Fine-tune an open image model for one style, here pixel art, and sell a one-time plugin that runs inside the tool the artist already uses, on their GPU. Not disclosed (example: 802 sales at $65 by June 2023). Operator-Reported. Local, Hard, 85% automated.

Honest catch: the income line does not state a monthly figure. The example is from 2023. One-time sales slow down when the launch audience has bought. The model runs on their machine, so you do not pay their inference bill, and you also cannot see their failures unless they write to you.

6. Sell the install, not the image

Stack: Local AI 1-Click Installers & Tutorials Patreon

Dr. Furkan Gözükara runs SECourses: YouTube tutorials plus a Patreon of 1-click installers for local image, video and voice apps, including ComfyUI and Stable Diffusion setups. Graphtreon estimates $3K–$12K/month (Oct 2026). The stored line is $3K–$12K (third-party estimate for the example). Operator-Reported. Local, Medium, 40% automated.

Honest catch: that range is a third-party model. He has not disclosed revenue himself. The maintenance never ends. This is on-camera work, not a faceless upload. Keep other people’s open-source licenses intact.

7. Host the ComfyUI graph studios already depend on

Stack: ComfyUI Workflow Hosting / API Platform

ComfyDeploy turns ComfyUI graphs, often built around Stable Diffusion and Flux, into APIs on GPUs the operator manages. The stored line is $0–$29K MRR (example, founder-reported). Operator-Reported. Local, Hard, 80% automated.

Honest catch: GPU bills and broken custom nodes are the business. Comfy Org’s own cloud is a funded competitor. Startup cost for this example is not disclosed. More of this shape is in the ComfyUI guide.

8. A phone app that also runs Stable Diffusion on-device

Stack: Offline Local AI Assistant Phone App (LLM Hub)

Chat, images and transcription run on the phone. The stack lists Stable Diffusion among the on-device tools. A$3,234 (~$2,284 USD) gross in month 1 (Timmy Qian on LinkedIn, Apr 12, 2026); A$1,532 in the last 30 days on the founder’s Appfigures dashboard (seen Oct 24, 2026). Operator-Reported. Local, Medium, 90% automated.

Honest catch: month one was higher than the later 30-day figure. Those are gross store numbers, before fees. The stack is a local assistant, not a Stable Diffusion product first. Phones now ship their own image tools.

Bottom line

How to make money with Stable Diffusion, on this site, is almost never “sell the PNG.” The documented local paths are an upscaler, a phone app, a host for custom models, one narrow job, a plugin, an installer, or a hosted workflow. The payment-checked phone app is about $877 MRR. Several of the larger figures are operator-reported or from 2023.

Related: how to make money with ComfyUI, how to make money with AI art, how to make money with Midjourney, AI business ideas if you own a GPU, local AI business ideas, how to make money with Replicate.

Every stack in this guide, side by side

This guide links 8 stacks. 2 have payment-verified revenue, and every disclosed startup cost is $99. The typical stack is about 90% automated, so plan on doing the rest yourself. "MRR" means monthly recurring revenue, what subscribers pay each month. Revenue figures come from each stack's source and date; tap a name for the full breakdown.

Stack	Revenue (as reported)	Startup cost	Difficulty	Automated
AI image upscaler SaaS built on open-source Stable Diffusion	$10.2M revenue in 2024 (2 people, ~90% gross margin after GPU costs), posted by Javi López on X, Apr 28, 2026.	Not disclosed	Hard	90%
On-Device AI Image Generator Phone App	$0–$3K+	$99	Hard	90%
Run-Your-Custom-Model Stable Diffusion Site	$0–$700 MRR (example, about 7 weeks after launch)	Not disclosed	Hard	90%
ComfyUI Workflow Hosting / API Platform	$0–$29K MRR (example, founder-reported)	Not disclosed	Hard	80%
Photo-to-Coloring-Page Generator	Not disclosed (posted in an HN thread for projects making $500+/mo; founder says it's growing 10–20%/month)	Not disclosed	Medium	90%
Local AI Plugin for a Niche Creative App	Not disclosed (example: 802 sales at $65 by June 2023)	Not disclosed	Hard	85%
Local AI 1-Click Installers & Tutorials Patreon	$3K–$12K (third-party estimate for the example)	Not disclosed	Medium	40%
Offline Local AI Assistant Phone App (LLM Hub)	A$3,234 (~$2,284 USD) gross in month 1 (Timmy Qian on LinkedIn, Apr 12, 2026); A$1,532 in the last 30 days on the founder's Appfigures dashboard (seen Oct 24, 2026)	Not disclosed	Medium	90%