Seedance or Seedream? ByteDance's Video and Image Families Explained

The two names are one letter apart, which causes a lot of confusion. Here is the difference in one line: Seedream makes still images, Seedance makes video. Both are built by ByteDance's Seed group. They are not rivals; they are two halves of a workflow. You make the picture (photo, poster, cover) in Seedream, then Seedance animates either your prompt or that picture, adding sound.

This guide lists every variant of both in Kadraris, explains how pricing differs, shows the frame-then-motion chain in code, and ends with picks for specific jobs.

Pick by job

For stills, Seedream:

• Poster, cover or any graphic with readable text: Seedream 5.0 Pro.
• Exact pixel dimensions for a portrait or packshot: Seedream 5.0 Pro or Flash.
• Retouching a selected region, cut-out background, or separate layers: Seedream 5.0 Flash.
• Many low-cost frames when time is not pressing: Seedream 5.0 Flash.
• A set of 4 coherent images per call, or 3K: Seedream 5.0 Lite.

For motion, Seedance:

• Quick motion tests: Seedance 2.0 Mini at 480p. Sound is off unless you turn it on.
• Reels at 720p, 15 seconds or less: Seedance 2.0 Fast or 2.0.
• 4K: Seedance 2.0 or 2.0 Eco.
• Budget 1080p, 15 seconds or less: Seedance 2.0 Mini Eco.
• One take beyond 15 seconds, heavy references, editing or extending: Seedance 2.5, or 2.5 Eco at 720p or 1080p to spend less.

What each family does

Seedream works from a prompt, optionally guided by reference pictures, and outputs 1K to 3K. Each version has its strength:

• 5.0 Pro renders text inside the image well.
• 5.0 Flash retouches selected regions and separates a picture into layers.
• 5.0 Lite returns as many as 4 images that belong together.

Seedance generates clips with sound from text, from an opening frame (a closing frame is optional), or from reference media:

• 2.0 makes 4-15 second clips, up to 4K.
• 2.5 goes up to 30 seconds in a single take, at up to 1080p.

The billing units differ as well: Seedream charges per image, Seedance per second of video.

Prices and limits for all ten variants

Images:

Video:

Video figures show what one second costs at the cheapest resolution; image figures show a single base-tier picture. Details the tables do not spell out:

• Seedance rates jump with resolution. A second at 720p is more than double a second at 480p, and 4K on Seedance 2.0 runs about five times the 720p rate. The version-by-version breakdown is in Seedance 2.0 or 2.5?.
• Seedream 5.0 Pro doubles at 2K compared with 1K, and each extra reference image beyond the first adds a small fee.
• Seedream 5.0 Flash has a flat price whatever the tier (1K, 1.5K, 2K) and however many references you send. It is the family's cheapest image, but slow: roughly 90 s at 1K and 160 s at 2K.
• Seedream 5.0 Lite counts every picture. A request for four is billed as four.
• Reference clips add to Seedance's bill. Seconds of video passed in video_urls are charged along with the output seconds.

Rates per resolution: model pages and pricing.

Frame first, motion second

I rarely use one without the other. I settle the frame in Seedream first, since images are cheap and show quickly whether composition, light and the character work. Next, Seedance receives it through image_url and starts the clip from it. No video seconds are spent until the starting picture is right.

1. Seedream 5.0 Pro or Flash: the frame, already in the final video's ratio (9:16 for a reel, for example).
2. Cheap motion tests: Seedance 2.0 Mini or Fast at 480p, several short takes from the same picture.
3. The real render: Seedance 2.0 when you need 4K, or 2.5 when you need up to 30 s, keeping image_url and sharpening the prompt.

Set aspect_ratio: "adaptive" and Seedance follows the ratio of the input image. The chain through the API:

import os
import time
import requests

API = "https://kadraris.com/v1"
H = {"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['KADRARIS_API_KEY']}"}

def run(model: str, inp: dict) -> dict:
    task = requests.post(
        f"{API}/generate", headers=H,
        json={"model": model, "input": inp}, timeout=30,
    ).json()
    print(model, task["id"], task["estimated_cost"])
    delay = 2
    while True:
        task = requests.get(f"{API}/tasks/{task['id']}",
                            headers=H, timeout=30).json()
        if task["status"] in ("succeeded", "failed"):
            return task
        time.sleep(delay)
        delay = min(delay * 1.5, 15)

# step 1: still frame from Seedream
frame = run("seedream-5.0-pro", {
    "prompt": ("A potter shaping a clay bowl on a wheel in a "
               "sunlit workshop, dust in the air, 35mm photo, "
               "natural skin texture"),
    "aspect_ratio": "9:16",
    "resolution": "1K",
})
if frame["status"] != "succeeded":
    raise SystemExit(frame["error"])
image_url = frame["output"][0]["url"]

# step 2: animate that frame with Seedance
clip = run("seedance-2.0-fast", {
    "prompt": ("The potter's hands lift the clay wall, the "
               "wheel spins, light shifts on the bench, slow "
               "push-in, no music"),
    "image_url": image_url,
    "aspect_ratio": "adaptive",
    "duration": 5,
    "resolution": "480p",
})
if clip["status"] == "succeeded":
    print(clip["output"][0]["url"], clip["cost"])
else:
    print("failed:", clip["error"])

Prefer clicking? Kadraris Studio lets you pick the finished picture as the opening frame when you fill in a Seedance job. The image to video guide covers photo animation in detail.

Head-to-head pages

Seedance inside its own family: base 2.0 against Fast and base 2.0 against Mini.

Seedance against other labs:

• Kuaishou: Kling with 2.0, Kling with 2.5
• Google: Veo with 2.5, Gemini Omni with 2.5
• MiniMax: H3 with 2.5
• Alibaba: Wan with 2.5, HappyHorse with 2.0
• xAI: Grok Imagine Video with 2.0

Seedream 5.0 Pro against other image models: Google's Pro model, Google's second-generation model and OpenAI's image model.

For the wider field, see the 2026 image generator ranking and the 2026 video generator ranking.

Questions

I typed "Seedream" but wanted a video. What happened?

You got an image, because Seedream only returns stills. For a clip, choose a Seedance variant, and if you like the image, pass it as Seedance's image_url.

What is the cheapest way to test both?

Seedream 5.0 Flash ($0.0343 per image) for images, as long as a wait of 1.5 to 3 minutes is fine, and Seedance 2.0 Mini at 480p (from $0.0784 per second) for motion. Move to a pricier variant only when frame and prompt are settled.

Should the Seedream frame match the video's aspect ratio?

Yes. Make the frame in the ratio you want the clip to have, and set Seedance to adaptive, so it keeps that ratio and nothing gets cropped.

Do the two need separate sign-ups?

No. Kadraris runs both families on a single key and shared funds. No plan to subscribe to, no expiry on money you added, and charges only for pictures and seconds that were generated.