Midjourney shows “the sum of all prompt weights must be positive” when negative weights outweigh positive ones. Midjourney’s Multi-Prompts & Weights documentation says “the total of all weights in your prompt needs to be a positive number”; if the total is zero or below, the job is rejected. The fix is to make the negative weight smaller, raise a positive weight, or drop part of the negative prompt.

On this page

How Midjourney adds up prompt weights

A multi-prompt splits your prompt into parts with a double colon ::. Midjourney reads each part separately and blends them. You can put a number right after the :: to set how much each part counts. Three rules from Midjourney’s docs decide the total:

  • A part without a number counts as 1. “If you don’t specify a weight, it defaults to 1.”
  • Negative numbers remove things. A negative weight tells Midjourney what you do not want in the image.
  • --no counts as -0.5. “Using the no parameter is the same as using a -0.5 weight.” Midjourney’s No parameter page says the same.

Add every weight together, including the hidden 1s and the -0.5 for each --no. If the result is not above zero, you get the error.

Worked examples from Midjourney’s docs

This prompt fails:

still life painting:: fruit::-2

“still life painting” has the default weight of 1, and “fruit” has -2. As Midjourney’s docs put it, “1 plus -2 equals -1, and that’s not positive”, so Midjourney shows an error. Source: Midjourney Docs, Multi-Prompts & Weights.

This one works:

still life painting:: fruit::-0.5

1 plus -0.5 is 0.5, which is positive. Source: Midjourney Docs, Multi-Prompts & Weights. The prompt is also in our library as still life painting with a negative weight.

And these two are equivalent, according to the same page:

vibrant tulip fields --no red

vibrant tulip fields:: red::-0.5

Source: Midjourney Docs, Multi-Prompts & Weights. See the library listing vibrant tulip fields without red.

How to fix the error

  1. Total your weights. Write down each part’s number, using 1 for parts without one and -0.5 for each --no.
  2. Shrink the negative weight. Changing fruit::-2 to fruit::-0.5 is the fix Midjourney’s own example uses.
  3. Or raise a positive weight. still life painting::3 fruit::-2 totals 1, which is positive.
  4. Count every --no term. Each one subtracts 0.5, so a long --no list on a short prompt can push the total to zero or below. Remove terms you do not need, or give the main subject a higher weight.
  5. Check the colon spacing. Midjourney says there should be no space on the left side of the double colon and a single space on the right, with any parameters at the very end of the prompt.

After the image is generated in the web app, you can hover over the prompt text to see each part of the multi-prompt with its weight, which helps you check the math.

Which versions support multi-prompts and weights

Midjourney’s docs say multi-prompts work with versions 1, 2, 3, 4, Niji 4, 5, Niji 5, 6, Niji 6 and 6.1. Versions 1, 2 and 3 accept whole-number weights only; versions 4, Niji 4, 5, Niji 5, 5.1, 5.2, 6 and 6.1 accept decimals such as 0.5 or 1.5.

Weights or --no: which to use

Use --no when you want something gone and do not need to fine-tune it; it is shorter and its weight is fixed at -0.5. Midjourney’s No page shows it with lists, for example:

still life gouache painting --no fruit, apple, pear

Source: Midjourney Docs, No; in our library as still life gouache painting without fruit. Use a negative multi-prompt weight when you want to control how strongly something is removed, and keep the total positive.

The No page also warns that Midjourney’s moderation reads every word after --no separately, so --no modern clothing is read as “no modern” and “no clothing”, which can trigger a warning. In that case describe the clothing you do want instead.