Midjourney Acquires Astrology App Co-Star to Finally Build Its Own Apps

Midjourney, the AI company that evolved from cranking out bizarre cat pictures to generating diagnostic-quality medical scans, just made a pivot that nobody had on their bingo card. The startup has acquired Co-Star, the personalized astrology app that serves up AI-powered horoscopes to millions of users. Bloomberg first reported the deal, which quietly closed this spring for an undisclosed sum.

This isn’t just a whimsical side quest. Co-Star founder Banu Guler isn’t cashing out and walking away. She’s stepping into the role of Midjourney’s chief design officer, effectively putting her in the driver’s seat for a problem that has bedeviled the company for years: building actual consumer applications. Midjourney’s image-generation models are stunning, but accessing them still feels like a 2021 time capsule—you have to wrestle with Discord bots or a web interface that lacks the polish of a native app.

David Holz, Midjourney’s founder, confirmed that Guler and her team will spearhead the development of the company’s first dedicated apps. The immediate priority is a standalone image-generation app, a move that suggests Midjourney is finally ready to step out of Discord’s shadow and compete directly with the native mobile experiences offered by OpenAI and others. Co-Star, which blends NASA data with AI to dispense daily cosmic advice, will continue operating under Guler’s leadership, giving Midjourney a direct line to a highly engaged consumer base that already trusts an AI with their feelings.

It’s a fascinating bet. Holz is acquiring not just a user base, but a specific design philosophy rooted in making algorithmic output feel intimate and personal. The real question is whether the team that made checking your Saturn return a daily ritual can translate that same magic to an image generator. If they pull it off, Midjourney’s distribution problem vanishes overnight.