Open Source Banner Generator API

A production REST API that generates product banner images on demand — no open source infrastructure to host, no template slots to fill, no GPU servers to maintain. POST your product photo and a scene prompt; the API handles background removal, AI compositing, and returns a banner-ready image in under 10 seconds. $0.026 per banner image — roughly half the cost of Bannerbear's Automate plan. 5,000 free credits (24-hour trial), no credit card.

Quick start — generate a banner in one API call

Sign up, copy your key from the dashboard, and POST your product image with a scene description. The endpoint queues the job and returns a generation_id. Poll GET /v1/image/{id} until status=completed, then download the banner from output_url.

# Generate banner — product on AI-composed background scene
curl -X POST https://api.pixelapi.dev/v1/image/replace-background \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -F "[email protected]" \
  -F "prompt=luxury gradient studio, soft light, e-commerce banner"
# Response: {"generation_id": "uuid", "status": "queued", ...}

# Poll until completed
curl https://api.pixelapi.dev/v1/image/UUID \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
# Response: {"status": "completed", "output_url": "https://...banner.jpg"}

pip install pixelapi
---
from pixelapi import PixelAPI

client = PixelAPI(api_key="YOUR_API_KEY")
result = client.replace_background(
    image="product.jpg",
    prompt="luxury gradient studio, soft light, e-commerce banner"
)
result.save("banner.jpg")  # banner-ready JPEG

npm install pixelapi
---
import { PixelAPI } from "pixelapi";

const client = new PixelAPI({ apiKey: process.env.PIXELAPI_KEY });
const result = await client.replaceBackground({
  image: "./product.jpg",
  prompt: "luxury gradient studio, soft light, e-commerce banner",
});
await result.save("banner.jpg");  // banner-ready JPEG

composer require pixelapi/pixelapi
---
<?php
use PixelAPI\Client;

$client = new Client(getenv("PIXELAPI_KEY"));
$result = $client->replaceBackground([
  "image"  => "product.jpg",
  "prompt" => "luxury gradient studio, soft light, e-commerce banner",
]);
file_put_contents("banner.jpg", $result->getBody());

gem install pixelapi
---
require "pixelapi"

client = PixelAPI::Client.new(api_key: ENV["PIXELAPI_KEY"])
result = client.replace_background(
  image: "product.jpg",
  prompt: "luxury gradient studio, soft light, e-commerce banner"
)
File.binwrite("banner.jpg", result.body)

go get github.com/pixelapi/pixelapi-go
---
import "github.com/pixelapi/pixelapi-go"

client := pixelapi.New("YOUR_API_KEY")
result, err := client.ReplaceBackground("product.jpg",
  pixelapi.Prompt("luxury gradient studio, soft light, e-commerce banner"))
if err != nil { panic(err) }
result.Save("banner.jpg")

Full banner pipeline — cut, compose, shadow

For maximum banner quality, combine three endpoints: remove the product background first, replace it with an AI-generated scene, then add a realistic drop shadow. Each step is a separate POST and independently pollable.

1. Remove background — POST /v1/image/remove-background — returns a transparent PNG cutout ($0.012)
2. Replace background — POST /v1/image/replace-background — composes product into an AI-generated scene ($0.026)
3. Add shadow — POST /v1/image/shadow — attaches a natural drop shadow matched to light direction ($0.026)

Total three-step pipeline: $0.064 per finished banner. Skip steps you don't need — replace-background alone ($0.026) handles most e-commerce banner use cases.

Pricing — lower than Bannerbear, no subscription lock-in

Bannerbear and Creatify pricing verified from each provider's public pricing page, October 2026. PixelAPI's per-image price is set at approximately half the cheapest commercial API rival per our pricing principle. adcreative.ai and pencil.ai pricing pages were unavailable at time of publication — check their sites for current rates.

Open source banner generator API — hosted vs self-hosted

Open source banner generators — Puppeteer HTML-to-image pipelines, PIL compositing scripts, ImageMagick templates — all work, but they come with real ongoing costs that rarely show up in the initial estimate:

What you get back

Banner sizes and common formats

PixelAPI's image editing endpoints accept any resolution input. Pass width and height on the request to specify your canvas. Common banner formats:

Common banner generation workflows

PixelAPI's image editing API is the foundation for these production workflows. Each links to a setup guide:

Integrations & SDKs

Comparison vs alternatives

Related image editing APIs

Banner generation is one part of a larger product image pipeline. These live PixelAPI endpoints work together:

Rate limits & error handling

20 requests/minute on the free trial, 60 on Starter, 120 on Pro, and 300 on Scale, with 3/10/20/50 concurrent jobs respectively. Exceeding the limit returns HTTP 429 with a Retry-After header. The recommended strategy is exponential backoff starting at 2s, doubling on each retry up to 30s. The Python and Node SDKs handle this automatically.

# Python SDK auto-retries 429 with backoff
from pixelapi import PixelAPI
client = PixelAPI(api_key="...", max_retries=4)
result = client.replace_background(image="bulk_product.jpg",
    prompt="clean white studio, soft shadow")  # auto-retries on 429

Common error codes: 400 invalid input (check image format or size), 402 insufficient credits, 429 rate limit exceeded, 503 temporary overload (retry after Retry-After). Failed jobs are auto-detected and credits are automatically refunded — you never pay for a broken banner.

Frequently asked questions