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KSampler (Advanced)

🧠 What Is This Node?​

The KSampler (Advanced) node is the fully loaded variant of the standard KSampler. Think of it as the same car, but now with a turbocharged engine, racing suspension, and a dashboard full of extra switches you may or may not understand yet.

It gives you precise control over every major sampling parameter β€” steps, CFG scale, sampler type, scheduler, denoise strength, and more β€” making it the go-to choice when you need consistent, high-quality, repeatable results or want to experiment with workflow tuning at a granular level.

If the standard KSampler is β€œgood enough” for most tasks, KSampler (Advanced) is what you use when you want to push boundaries, run controlled experiments, or debug exactly why your AI thinks a cat should have three tails.

KSampler (Advanced)

🧩 Real-World Use-Cases​

  • High-control text-to-image workflows with reproducible results
  • Image-to-image refinement where denoise strength determines how much the original is preserved
  • Prompt A/B testing with locked seed values
  • Testing sampler/scheduler compatibility for optimal style results
  • Multi-stage workflows where latents are passed through various transformations before decoding

πŸ”Œ Inputs​

model (Required)​

  • What it is: The diffusion model to use for generation.
  • Why it matters: Different models have different strengths; the wrong choice here is like asking a watercolor artist to carve marble.
  • Requirements: Must be a valid model loaded into ComfyUI.

seed (Integer)​

  • Default: 0
  • Range: 0 to 0xffffffffffffffff
  • What it does: Initializes the random number generator for reproducibility. Same seed + same parameters = identical result every time.
  • Tips:
    • Lock it to iterate on prompt changes consistently.
    • Randomize for variety.
  • Caution: Changing the seed by just 1 can produce a completely different image.

steps (Integer)​

  • Default: 20
  • Range: 1 to 10,000 (but don’t β€” unless you enjoy watching progress bars more than making art)
  • Function: Number of sampling iterations. Higher values generally = better quality, but diminishing returns past ~30–50 for most models.

cfg (Float)​

  • Default: 8.0
  • Range: 0.0 to 100.0 (increments of 0.1)
  • Function: Classifier-Free Guidance scale β€” how closely the model follows the positive conditioning.
    • Low (<5): Loose, interpretive
    • Medium (7–12): Balanced adherence
    • High (>15): Strict adherence, risk of harsh outlines or unrealistic detail
  • Tip: Start around 7–9 and adjust.

sampler name (Dropdown)​

  • Function: The algorithm that drives the sampling process.
  • Impact: Can drastically change detail sharpness, style, and rendering speed.
  • Examples: euler, dpmpp_2m, heun, ddim, lcm
  • Note: Some samplers perform better with certain schedulers β€” choose wisely.

scheduler (Dropdown)​

  • Function: Determines how noise is scheduled over the steps.
  • Impact: Affects smoothness, contrast, and convergence speed.
  • Examples: normal, karras, exponential, sgm_uniform
  • Tip: karras often yields smoother high-quality results.

positive (Conditioning Input, Required)​

  • What it is: The β€œdo this” list for your model. Usually comes from CLIP text encoding.
  • Tip: Keep it clear and concise β€” overloading with too many descriptors can muddy results.
  • What it is: The β€œdon’t you dare” list for your model.
  • Purpose: Suppresses unwanted traits (e.g., blurry, watermark, extra limbs).

latent image (Required)​

  • Function: The starting point in latent space β€” either random noise (text-to-image) or an encoded image (image-to-image).
  • Caution: With denoise=1.0, it will ignore any structure from the latent and start fresh.

denoise (Float)​

  • Default: 1.0
  • Range: 0.0 to 1.0 (increments of 0.01)
  • Function: Controls how much of the starting latent is preserved.
    • 1.0 β†’ Full redraw from scratch
    • 0.5 β†’ Half preserved, half new
    • 0.1 β†’ Light refinements
  • Pro Tip: For subtle edits, keep this low; for wild reimaginings, crank it up.

πŸ“€ Outputs​

LATENT​

The refined latent representation of the generated image, ready for decoding or further processing.

πŸ’‘ Usage Tips​

  • Seed discipline: Lock seeds when testing prompts; change seeds to explore variety.
  • Steps efficiency: Avoid going overboard β€” most gains happen under 50 steps.
  • CFG sweet spot: 7–12 works for most models without forcing unnatural detail.
  • Sampler/scheduler pairing: Experiment, but check known compatibility first.
  • Denoise control: Low for polishing, high for creative chaos.

πŸ”₯ What-Not-To-Do-Unless-You-Want-a-Fire​

  • Steps = 10,000. Your GPU will hate you.
  • CFG = 100. Enjoy your crunchy, overbaked AI noodles.
  • Denoise = 1.0 on a refined image you actually liked.
  • Mismatched sampler/scheduler combos without testing.

⚠️ Known Issues​

  • Incompatible sampler/scheduler combos can yield flat or noisy results.
  • Extremely high CFG can cause oversharpening, harsh outlines, or strange artifacts.
  • Very high step counts waste time with minimal visible improvement.
  • Some models react badly to extreme denoise settings.

πŸ“ Final Notes​

The KSampler (Advanced) node is where you stop being a passenger and start piloting the generation process yourself. It’s more powerful, more configurable, and less forgiving than the standard KSampler β€” but in the right hands, it’s the difference between β€œpretty good” and β€œwow, how did you do that?”