Enabling human ideas: Canva’s AI 2.0 and the rise of conversational design

The prevalence of AI has led to repetitive content being distributed. Ask a chat engine to create a unique setting of a landscape and you will find that every engine, whether Claude or Co-Pilot will produce the same design.

Canva hopes its new technology could tackle this lack of growing unoriginality. The Sydney-based startup announced the launch of its latest AI platform, Canva AI 2.0.

To mark this development, members of the press were invited to attend a breakfast press conference where Cameron Adams, co-founder and CPO provided more detail on the product and its potential.

Canva AI 2.0 is a conversational design platform that allows users to speak onto the platform directly. Users can ask to design or expand on a particular idea, and the software will create an image that is unique to the user.

Users are still able to collaborate, having the ability to edit or tweak the design as they see fit.

“Voice is becoming important in the AI and design space. With Canva AI 2.0 you can talk to AI about your concepts, and it will sort out your thoughts and create the content that you want to achieve,”

“It is conversational all the way through, the design can be reedited by yourself or by the AI itself – and it will stay consistent,” he says.

Adams says that Canva 2.0 allows users to communicate ideas of a new business which the AI will generate to unlock a real-world idea.

He says that Canva AI 2.0 combines three silos that were previously in separate silos which impacted on the potential of high-quality designs: creativity, productivity and intelligence.

“When you separate these things, you create fiction. We want design to be simple enough for anyone to approach, making complex things simple,” he says.

The success of Canva 2.0

When this AI was launched, Adams says that the demand for the product led to issues with the site becoming overloaded.

“Too many people want to use it because it was seen as more engaging,” he says. “This was causing an overload on architecture and increased costs to generate content.”

He continues: “We had to make the system more efficient and cost effective. So, the team looked at optimising models and figuring out cost savings,” he says.

After this, Adams said that the team was about to get the cost down and deliver the experience in a much more efficient way.

They were able to reduce cost per task by 90% meaning they could rollout more users and include free users in the experience.

The models are now up to five times faster and 30x cheaper to run, according to Adams.

Canva’s history with AI

Canva is no stranger to using AI. In 2017, the company started to experiment with its potential, hiring data scientists to see what recommendations the company could use to incorporate GenAI into its platform.

“We wanted to use AI to make lives better and make content better. It is a turbo-boost to our mission,” says Adams.

This led to the creation of their products such as Magic Design, where the AI generator takes text prompts or uploaded media and instantly produces fully designed, on-brand templates.

In 2024, they also launched Magic Studio, an end-to-end full suite design studio of AI tools that lets you generate, edit, write, animate, and translate complete designs without leaving Canva.

As part of the launch messaging, Adams emphasised Canva’s belief that “AI is an enabler of human ideas,” a theme that ran throughout the presentation.

Since its incorporation of AI, it has been reported that 65% of all Canva users use AI tools daily and over 10 billion total AI tools have been used since its launch.

A background into Canva

Businesses across the globe have adopted Canva to help automate and create complex designs at the click of a button.

Designs that would previously take days or weeks to accomplish have been simplified with Canva, whilst also saving costs for users, according to Adams.

Since its launch in 2013, Canva now reports 25 million monthly users.

Various products have already been launched on Canva such as its Visual Suite which provides solutions for entire workflows of a creative idea. It is the full collection of Canva’s design tools, presentations, documents, whiteboards and social content, bundled into one unified platform.

Other products include Canva Sheets which is used to create content to scale and Canva Brand, which helps businesses build their company identity from logos to photography.

Canva’s growth story 

Canva reports strong adoption since launch. The company has reported that 1.4 billion documents have been created with Canva, as well as 4.5 billion presentations and 52 billion designs made in its lifetime.

Canva also highlighted adoption among larger organisations. Major companies such as Airbus have reportedly used the platform for its designs.

In addition, Canva has raised $570 million in total funding and is valued at $26 billion. The company has the potential to reach IPO status, but Adams said it is not a priority for them.

“We are in no rush for an IPO,” he says. “There is so much value in being a private company and we can make moves that other companies can’t.”

Why visual designs matter

Adams stresses that we are living in a visual world, and because of this, design itself has become so important.

“Videos, images and more are becoming more engaging allowing us to connect in a more interactive way,” he says.

Adams claims that visual design has become the main way of communicating in modern times.

“In the past we told stories through word of mouth or newspapers. When the printing press and graphic design rose, it began to shift. Then the invention of PCs brought about visual design capabilities,” he says.

“Visual design, at the beginning on PCs, was very limited and complicated to work, but with Canva you can create something where you are,” he says.

Adams says that every industry and job now requires visual communication as its primary way of communicating, no matter the job.

“Visual design is now a critical part of any job,” he says.

Canva reports that 84% of business leaders say poor visual communications cause delays and confusions for staff and 87% of Gen Z said that visual communication skills are critical to future work.

A charitable startup

Adams closed the event with a noticeable pivot toward Canva’s social impact commitments, emphasising charity, environmental action and long-term philanthropic plans.

“Canva gives its product away free to teachers and nonprofits to support the people doing the most important work,” he says.

On top of that, 30% of Canva’s equity has been committed to a two‑step plan to drive long‑term social impact.

The company has marked out a plan to ensure that it is also giving back to the world.

“The first step is the Canva Foundation, a registered charity focused on providing relief and support to communities around the world,” Adams says.

“The second step is environmental action. Canva plants one tree for every print order, and so far, that’s resulted in 18 million trees planted. They’re also investing in emissions reduction, including funding a solar farm and partnering with organisations to cut carbon across their operations,” he says.

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