Nano Banana
Google's image generation and editing model inside the Gemini app.
Nano Banana, Google's image model in the Gemini app, hit an obvious product-market fit moment that the team swarmed, despite a playful name that cuts against clarity advice. Its brand pull also drew App Store clones: eight of the top 11 results were clones, and the top one earned over $40,000 in 30 days before removal. Lesson: strong demand attracts imitators, so avoid brandjacking trending names.
- 1Iterate on an imageNano Banana or GPT Image 2, cheap shots
- 2Reach an authentic lookKeep going until it's not plastic
- 3Use it as referenceFeed the image to the video model
- 4Generate the videoSeedance 2 or Veo 3
From Marcus Burke's workflow
What was said about Nano Banana
Clone apps using the Nano Banana name made money until Apple removed them. Before Apple's cleanup, eight of the top 11 App Store results for the term (search traffic score 61) were clone apps. The top one made over $40,000 in 30 days per AppFigures, then Apple removed it on October 6, days after Steve P. Young posted about it on LinkedIn.
Young calls building an app around a web-only brand name or a platform keyword like Liquid Glass grey hat, and says a developer in Brazil has done very well with it. Reviewers vary, so submission timing can change what gets through, but the Nano Banana removals show the risk is high.
Nano Banana was an obvious product-market fit moment the Gemini team swarmed. Josh Woodward lists Nano Banana on Gemini with NotebookLM podcasts, Flow and Stitch as products where fit was obvious when it arrived and the team ended up swarming it and holding on for dear life.
Woodward calls that swarm "so exhausting and so fun." Robby Stein notes it was built by a scrappy, fun team that chose a playful name, which runs against his own advice to name products for clarity; it is an image editor, separate from the visual AI Mode search.
Iterate on a scene image first, then animate the best one. For app video ads, Marcus Burke generates the scene with an image model such as GPT Image 2 or Nano Banana until it looks authentic, then uses it as the reference image in a video model such as Seedance 2 or Veo 3.
Images are cheaper to iterate on, while prompting video directly burns credits: "it's going to be much easier to get it right with an image model and it's much cheaper." He finds Nano Banana weaker than GPT Image on fine print, and uses Higgsfield to access many models under one subscription.
Why every company now needs to think and operate like a lab team | Josh Woodward (VP Google Labs)
Woodward lists it among the products that had an obvious product-market fit moment, where the team swarmed it and held on for dear life.
Nano Banana was an obvious product-market fit moment the Gemini team swarmed. Josh Woodward lists Nano Banana on Gemini with NotebookLM podcasts, Flow and Stitch as products where fit was obvious when it arrived and the team ended up swarming it and holding on for dear life.
Woodward calls that swarm "so exhausting and so fun." Robby Stein notes it was built by a scrappy, fun team that chose a playful name, which runs against his own advice to name products for clarity; it is an image editor, separate from the visual AI Mode search.
How to Build a $2M/Month App (Copy Me)
Used to create the first-step scene image for video, but weaker on fine print than GPT Image.
Iterate on a scene image first, then animate the best one. For app video ads, Marcus Burke generates the scene with an image model such as GPT Image 2 or Nano Banana until it looks authentic, then uses it as the reference image in a video model such as Seedance 2 or Veo 3.
Images are cheaper to iterate on, while prompting video directly burns credits: "it's going to be much easier to get it right with an image model and it's much cheaper." He finds Nano Banana weaker than GPT Image on fine print, and uses Higgsfield to access many models under one subscription.
Black Hat App Growth Strategies You Don’t Know (But Your Competitors Might Be Using)
The keyword scored 61 for search traffic, and before the cleanup eight of the top 11 App Store results were clone apps. The top clone made over $40,000 in 30 days before Apple removed it on October 6.
Clone apps using the Nano Banana name made money until Apple removed them. Before Apple's cleanup, eight of the top 11 App Store results for the term (search traffic score 61) were clone apps. The top one made over $40,000 in 30 days per AppFigures, then Apple removed it on October 6, days after Steve P. Young posted about it on LinkedIn.
Young calls building an app around a web-only brand name or a platform keyword like Liquid Glass grey hat, and says a developer in Brazil has done very well with it. Reviewers vary, so submission timing can change what gets through, but the Nano Banana removals show the risk is high.
Inside Google's AI turnaround: AI Mode, AI Overviews, and vision for AI-powered search | Robby Stein
Built by a scrappy, fun team that chose a playful name, which goes against Stein's clarity advice. It is an image editor, not the new visual AI Mode search.
Nano Banana was an obvious product-market fit moment the Gemini team swarmed. Josh Woodward lists Nano Banana on Gemini with NotebookLM podcasts, Flow and Stitch as products where fit was obvious when it arrived and the team ended up swarming it and holding on for dear life.
Woodward calls that swarm "so exhausting and so fun." Robby Stein notes it was built by a scrappy, fun team that chose a playful name, which runs against his own advice to name products for clarity; it is an image editor, separate from the visual AI Mode search.
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