Krea 2 was announced on May 12 2026 by Krea AI. It’s the company’s first image model built from scratch.
The model is made for creators, designers, marketers and visual teams who need fast image testing with more control over style.
Its main focus is style control. You can give it one reference image, mix several references or make a moodboard. Then it can follow the colors, textures, brush style, layout and general look.
Contra Labs tested Krea 2 Large against GPT Image 2, Gemini 3 Pro Image Preview and Seedream 5.0 Lite. The test looked at prompt following, image quality, use value and style match.
Krea 2 Large ranked second for style transfer. It scored 3.39 out of 5 for style match, while GPT Image 2 scored 3.53. That’s a small 0.14 gap. Gemini scored 2.74 and Seedream scored 2.42.
The results show Krea does well when the job is all about copying a look. It keeps colors, brushwork and mood close to the reference image. But it can be less bold when the prompt asks for something the reference doesn’t show.
Krea treats the reference like a rule. Other models treat it more like a starting point.
So K2 Large makes sense when you already have a clear style and want to apply it to a new subject without much drift. For text-led image work where the prompt does more of the creative work, Contra Labs tests point to other models.
If you'd like to access this model, you can explore the following possibilities:
