Negative prompts
A negative prompt tells a model what to move away from. It is genuinely useful for a narrow set of recurring artefacts, and close to useless for everything else - Including most of what enormous copied lists claim to fix.
What actually works
A short, targeted list beats a long inherited one every time.
Quality artefacts
'Worst quality, low quality, jpeg artifacts, blurry'. These address real failure modes and cost little attention.
Anatomy
'Bad anatomy, malformed hands, extra fingers'. These help measurably, because they are common labelled failures.
Specific unwanted elements
Naming something you keep getting - 'hat', 'glasses' - Works well when a model keeps adding it.
What does not work
Negatives cannot add anything. This is the most common misunderstanding.
- 'Not boring' will not produce an interesting composition. Fix that with camera choice instead.
- Abstract negatives like 'ugly' consume attention without a clear target.
- If you want something, put it in the positive prompt. That is what it is for.
Why huge lists hurt
Every negative term draws attention away from something else. A hundred-term list dilutes the few that matter and pulls the image toward a bland average - The model steering away from so many things it ends up nowhere in particular. Ten to twenty targeted terms is the working range. Composition fixes hands better than any negative - See the pose guide and the blueprint.
Common questions
How long should a negative prompt be?
Ten to twenty targeted terms. Beyond that you dilute the ones that work.
Can a negative prompt fix hands?
It helps, but composition helps more. Occluded or resting hands succeed far more reliably.
Should I copy negative prompts from other people?
Only as a starting point, and trim them hard. Most circulated lists are far longer than they need to be.
Where to go next
This guide pairs with the positive prompt, test in the studio and model differences.