Google’s Stitch Gets a Major Upgrade: From Image to Functional App with AI
Google continues its relentless push into the AI space, with frequent and powerful updates to its Gemini ecosystem. A standout beneficiary of this innovation is Stitch, a tool designed to transform ideas into tangible software designs. Recently, Stitch received two significant upgrades that are set to redefine how we approach UI/UX design and software development. These updates introduce the Redesign Agent, powered by a new model whimsically named Nano Banana Pro, and a seamless 1-Click Export to AI Studio, bridging the gap between static design and functional code.
A New Era of Design: Iteration and Control
[0:00:08.203]
While we’ve seen impressive updates from Stitch before, these latest enhancements are particularly noteworthy. The platform is evolving beyond just generating fresh design concepts from scratch. It’s now stepping into the realm of iteration, allowing designers and developers to refine and rework existing designs with unprecedented ease and control. This shift signifies a move from simple idea generation to a more sophisticated and practical design workflow.
These updates take it a step further. They are moving from just generating fresh ideas to actually iterating on existing ones and giving developers way more control under the hood.
[1:01.385]
At its core, Stitch excels at bridging the conceptual gap between “I have an idea” and “here is what it looks like.” With these new features, it’s not just about creating a single visual representation but about exploring multiple variations, making nuanced changes, and transforming a basic concept into a polished, functional prototype—all within a streamlined, AI-powered environment.
Augment Code: The Professional’s AI Coding Assistant
Before diving deeper into Stitch’s new features, it’s worth noting the advancements in professional AI coding tools.
[2:02.100]
It integrates seamlessly into your existing workflow, supporting VS Code, JetBrains, Vim, and even Cursor, without requiring forks or compromises. Security is paramount; Augment Code is secure by default, never trains on your proprietary code, and supports customer-managed encryption keys. With per-message pricing, you only pay for successful requests. Its new Remote Agents feature even allows you to launch, monitor, and merge pull requests from parallel cloud workers, saving your local CPU. If you’re ready to code with an AI that keeps up, you can sign up for a free 14-day trial at augment.code.com.
The Redesign Agent and the Power of Nano Banana Pro
[2:41.258]
The first major update is the introduction of Stitch’s Redesign Agent, which is powered by a new, humorously named model called Nano Banana Pro. Despite its silly name, the technology behind it is seriously impressive. This image generation model, based on the Gemini 3.0 Pro architecture, is designed to reason about an image before generating a new one.
[3:02.723]
This capability fundamentally shifts the design workflow from “text-to-design” to “image-to-design.” In the past, you would type a detailed prompt to generate a visual. To make changes, you had to describe those changes in text, which could often be frustrating and imprecise. The Nano Banana Pro model changes this by allowing you to work directly with visuals.
[3:35.341]
The new process is remarkably intuitive. You can take a screenshot of any existing dashboard, website, or app and paste it directly into Stitch. By entering the Redesign mode, you can then provide a simple, high-level prompt to guide the transformation. For example, you could take a cluttered analytics dashboard and simply ask the AI to “make this modern with blue colors.”
[4:52.484]
The Redesign Agent doesn’t just treat the screenshot as a flat image. It analyzes the content, identifies the individual components (like sidebars, charts, and data tables), and understands the structural hierarchy. It then regenerates the entire interface according to your prompt, applying modern UI principles. In the demo, a dense table was transformed into a spacious, card-based layout with improved typography and padding—all in about ten seconds. This powerful feature effectively solves the “blank page problem” by giving you a rich starting point for any project.
[5:53.078]
The model excels at stylistic overhauls. A standard SaaS landing page with a dark theme can be completely re-imagined with a prompt like, “Make it light themed and minimal with wooden aesthetics.” The AI understands the aesthetic and recontextualizes every element—from fonts and container borders to buttons—while preserving the original layout’s integrity. This makes the “remix culture” of design accessible to everyone.
From Visuals to Functionality: The AI Studio Integration
[7:37.493]
Perhaps the most critical update is the new integration with Google’s AI Studio. A common pain point with AI design tools is that they often produce beautiful but non-functional “hollow shells.” You get a pretty picture, but the buttons don’t do anything. Stitch addresses this head-on by pairing with AI Studio to act as the “engine room” for your designs.
[8:06.121]
The workflow is transformed into a seamless pipeline:
- Design in Stitch: Use Stitch and the Redesign Agent to get the visuals just right. Tweak the layout, colors, and overall vibe until you are satisfied.
- Export to AI Studio: Once the design is complete, a new “Export to AI Studio” button moves your project into a coding environment.
- Build with Natural Language: In AI Studio, you can add functionality using simple, natural language prompts. This includes building logic, handling events, and integrating APIs.
[8:13.791]
This integration effectively turns the design process into a building process. You create the visual shell in Stitch and then give it a “brain” in AI Studio. While it may not be for building massive, enterprise-level backends just yet, it’s perfect for creating fully functional prototypes and lightweight applications that can interact with a device’s camera, microphone, or external APIs.
It’s giving us a bridge out of the no-code interface and into the pro-code environment.
By combining the iterative design power of the Nano Banana Pro model with the functional code generation of AI Studio, Google is creating a powerful pipeline that takes you from an initial idea all the way to a working application. This is a massive step forward, signaling a future where the line between designing and building software becomes increasingly blurred.