Changelog

Highlights of each release. Full notes and every installer are on GitHub releases. Mural checks for updates by itself and shows a tray notice when one is ready.

Safety

• Report AI content: AI Chat and the AI tools have a Report button. If something the AI made is inappropriate or harmful, report it in a sentence; it goes privately to the Mural developer, who reviews every one.

Pricing

• Mural is now CA$4.99, once, after a 7-day free trial. No subscription is needed for the app itself.
• A Mural Pro plan includes the app.
• If you installed Mural before this version, you keep the app free. Thank you for being an early user.
• 14-day money-back guarantee on every payment: the app and each Mural Pro month. See the refunds page.
• The trial's 7 days only start counting once buying opens, so nobody's trial runs out before they can buy.

Fixes

• Animations turn into frames on every PC: Some PCs' video decoders hand back black or empty frames, or stall while seeking. Mural now checks the frames and, when they look wrong, decodes the clip in software instead (the frames are the same). A PC where that happened keeps using software decoding.
• Diagnostics: Mural keeps a small log of decoding problems and editor errors on your PC; Settings → Diagnostics → Open log folder finds it if support asks.

AI Chat

• AI Chat (Mural Pro): a chat beside the canvas that makes changes for you. Describe what you want and it moves, restyles, builds and animates layers while you watch; everything can be undone, and anything that paints or animates asks you first. Mural Pro charges by what each step uses, usually 1-3 credits.
• AI apps (MCP): turn on Settings → AI apps and Claude Desktop, Claude Code or any MCP client can read and change your wallpapers with the same 27 tools. One click adds Mural to Claude Desktop. Only apps on your PC with the key can connect.

Animation

• Split into layers: the AI separates the character, statues, mist and so on onto their own layers over a repainted background, each with mouse parallax and a gentle looping motion. No video needed.
• Animate in layers: the whole picture is animated once, then every frame is split into an animated background and each animated part, all in sync, each with its own parallax. Works both ways: animate a split group, or split an existing animation.
• The background behind split parts keeps the original picture everywhere else and is repainted only where the parts were, so nothing shows twice.
• Softer animation that stays close to your picture, and AI tools that always add new layers instead of changing the original.
• The Library lists your saved animations, ready to add to any wallpaper.
• Animate is simpler: pick an animate plan (Bring to life, Drifting sky, Magic glow, Breathe, Cinematic, Specific parts, Custom or Parallax layers) and its settings open right under it. Every plan has extra details, strength, how close to stay to your picture, camera, characters, loop, quality, clip length, playback speed, frames to keep, Separate into layers, and Try twice, keep the calmer one.
• Big pictures animate properly: the new Motion map plan moves clouds, mist, water, smoke and glows across your full-resolution picture in one seamless loop, at any size up to triple 4K, with no video tiles and no seams. Pictures wider than one video clip use it automatically, and the main character can still get its own AI clip at the picture's resolution. Tune drift, sway, shimmer and loop length in the layer's properties.
• AI animations no longer zoom or wander off: the new default quality, Seamless loop (Kling O1), uses your picture as both the first and the last frame, so every clip returns to your exact picture and loops forward with no back-and-forth. Motion maps search wide pictures section by section, move visibly, and swirl portals and vortexes.

Editor and multi-monitor

• Groups can be nested: group layers inside a group to make a sub-group, or group whole groups to wrap them.
• Windows can be moved by dragging their title bar.
• + Add AI Layer opens a page of AI tools; each one opens in its own window with its price shown up front.
• Wide pictures for multi-monitor canvases are painted in parts and stitched, since one AI picture can be at most 3:1.
• Canvas sizes for Dual and Triple 4K as well as Dual and Triple 1080p, plus one sized to your own monitors; a desktop-sized canvas is laid across every display.
• Updates install silently and Mural restarts by itself; no setup wizard.

Fixes

• Pictures show on the desktop again: the wallpaper windows could not load saved pictures, so a picture wallpaper applied as a blank desktop.
• An AI animation that finishes while Mural is minimized or behind other windows now becomes frames instead of an empty layer. If extraction ever fails, the message says why, and Re-extract retries for free.

Pictures by OpenAI

• Generate and generative fill use OpenAI GPT Image by default (7 credits, 20 at best quality); Stability AI keeps background removal and upscaling, and can still paint pictures if you choose it in Settings (5 credits). Your own OpenAI API key works too.
• From Oct 23, Pro, Plus and Studio are CA$9.99, CA$19.99 and CA$39.99 a month. Subscribing by the end of Oct 22 keeps CA$5, CA$12 or CA$25 for as long as the subscription stays active.

You decide what goes on the desktop

• Mural no longer opens a wallpaper by itself: the editor starts on an empty wallpaper and shows your Library, so you pick what to work on.
• Nothing reaches the desktop until you click ▶ Apply. A first run no longer puts the sample on the desktop, and opening a template from the Library opens it for editing instead of applying it. After a restart Mural shows the wallpaper you last applied.

Editor

• + Add layer and + Add AI Layer sit under the layer list, replacing the Add layer and AI buttons in the top bar.
• In the layer list, Shift-click selects every layer between the last one you clicked and this one, and Ctrl-click adds or removes one.
• Edit this wallpaper with AI works again. It had failed every time with "temporarily unavailable" and never charged.
• Dropdowns no longer cut off their text (the AI model, the layer blend mode, picture quality and others).

Bring pictures to life

• Animate tab presets: Bring to life (idle motion like a game login screen: hair and cloth sway, particles drift, glows flicker, the camera stays put), Breathe and Cinematic.
• Layers can react to music: an audio-reactive motion (scale, opacity, position or rotation follows bass, mids or treble) and an audio amount on every effect preset. Capture what the PC plays from Settings → Performance.
• Custom GLSL shader layers with a Shadertoy-style mainImage, live compile errors in the panel, and iTime / iMouse / iAudio / iClick inputs, plus iChannel0 (a picture you choose) and iChannel1 (the live music spectrum).
• Layers can be scheduled: only between certain hours, or only in certain weather, with a fade. Switching wallpapers crossfades instead of cutting.

Design tools

• Multi-select (Shift/Ctrl-click, marquee, Ctrl+A), groups (Ctrl+G), distribute, text-box width handles, sequence frame reorder, a keyboard route for the mask, and Export loop (WebM).
• Library: rename, search, Apply from the card, Live badge, per-card Export and Duplicate, playlist order and Add current.

Gaming laptops

• Settings → Performance shows the measured frame rate, the real refresh rate and the GPU in use, with a warning when Windows fell back to software rendering.
• Game mode unloads the wallpaper after 30 s of a fullscreen game and brings it back afterwards; a per-app pause list; a battery percentage threshold; Windows' own fullscreen signal is honoured.
• A Test button for each personal AI key.

Billing safeguards

• Every AI button checks the cost against your balance first; spends of 30 credits or more ask for confirmation and show what will be left; a failed animation keeps the generated picture as a layer; upgrades open the billing portal rather than a second checkout; credits reset on your own billing date with 25 welcome credits in the first period.

Accessibility

• Tooltips show on keyboard focus, the toolbar folds into a More menu at large interface zoom, dialogs and the crop box fit small windows, the layer palette and the desktop editor are fully keyboard-operable.

Starting points

• Ten templates, each with a one-click Use this. The welcome card now offers three choices: start from a template, open the sample scene, or begin empty.
• Closing the editor with unapplied changes asks Apply, Discard or Keep editing instead of losing work.
• Next wallpaper in the toolbar, the tray and the eye button's menu; a Wallpapers submenu in the tray lists your library; mural:// links open or install a wallpaper from the website.

Mural Pro

• Founder pricing: subscribe before Oct 23, 2026 and your plan keeps its current price for as long as that subscription stays active.
• Credits now reset on your billing date, not the 1st of the month, and new keys start with 25 welcome credits.
• Every AI button checks your balance before it starts, and a job that fails or is cancelled refunds its credits automatically.

Performance

• Frame caps for 120 and 144 Hz displays, a performance readout in Settings, and a storage cleanup that removes orphaned frames and clips.

Editor

• Smart guides that snap to other layers and the canvas centre, a rotate handle, and copy/paste for layers. Click ripples on the desktop controls.
• Accessibility pass: labels on every control, a live region for status messages, an interface zoom setting, and reduced motion when Windows asks for it.

Fixes

• The right-click-menu setting applies again; the 1 and 2 fps modes hold their rate; stars no longer drift; banding in the aurora and gradient shaders is gone; glow no longer shows a rectangle around text; the clock's AM/PM no longer overlaps the digits.

Right-click menu

• The eye button on the desktop now has a right-click menu with every Mural action: Edit this wallpaper, Open Mural, Next wallpaper, hide/show and arrange icons, and Hide this button. It works on Windows 11 without touching the system menu.
• New option in Settings → Desktop: "Put Mural in the main right-click menu (Windows 11)". It restores the full Windows 10-style menu so Mural is a top-level entry instead of living under "Show more options". Explorer restarts for a moment; the wallpaper re-attaches by itself.
• Settings now says that Shift+right-click opens the full menu directly.

Finding the controls

• The welcome card, the ? shortcuts sheet, the first tray notice, Settings and the website now spell out where Mural's buttons are: the eye button at the bottom-right of the desktop (click hides icons, right-click opens the menu), the tray icon under the taskbar's ^ arrow, and "Show more options" in the desktop menu.

Built from a round of reviews by six kinds of user: first-timer, designer, careful buyer, gamer on a laptop, low-vision keyboard user, and Wallpaper Engine veteran.

Performance and reliability

• Pausing now really stops the GPU: under a fullscreen game or on battery the renderer stops, videos pause, and the wallpaper window on the covered display is hidden. Any fullscreen app pauses every display; a maximized app hides only its own. Web wallpapers are throttled like a background tab.
• Correct geometry on scaled displays (150% 4K, laptop panels). Monitors plugged, unplugged or rescaled, and Explorer restarts, rebuild the wallpaper windows automatically.
• Pause state is re-checked after sleep/wake. Update checks skip battery power. "Start with Windows" and "Pause on battery" are on by default for new installs. On battery the wallpaper drops to a still frame a second (the clock keeps ticking).
• The tray icon now shows in the installed app, with "Start wallpaper" and a "Pause wallpaper" toggle. Still scenes render at 1 to 2 fps instead of 60.

Security

• Web wallpapers no longer get Mural's internal bridge, so a page cannot spend credits, read your files or change settings. They run in their own session with downloads, popups, permission prompts and sound blocked.

Money and transparency

• Edit with AI shows its price on the button and lets you pick Fast (5 credits) or Best (20); the default is Fast.
• Settings → Mural Pro has "Manage or cancel subscription", honest price notes, and a "What leaves your PC" section. Animation jobs survive network blips, refund on download failure, and keep finished clips in My animations.

Editor

• Canvas zoom and pan (Ctrl+wheel, Ctrl+0 fit, Ctrl+1 real pixels, Space+drag), alignment buttons, scale in %, rotation to a tenth of a degree.
• Text layers: every weight from Thin to Black, letter spacing, line height, italic, uppercase, shadow blur/offset/colour, a font picker.
• Export PNG at full canvas size (covers the whole spanned desktop). Three templates: Snowy night, Synthwave, Rainy evening. Animated GIFs play. Export and import wallpapers as a single .mural file; .mural files open from Explorer.
• A welcome card on first launch. Keyboard: focusable layer rows, context menus from the keyboard, a ? / F1 shortcuts sheet, dialogs that trap focus and never land on a destructive button, higher-contrast helper text.
• 12-hour clocks and Fahrenheit where the locale uses them; the weather city defaults to your time zone's city. Friendly names for effects and motion. Locked layers are read-only and cannot be deleted.
• Desktop icons: the original layout is saved by icon name, only primary-display icons move, Windows' auto-arrange is restored with the layout, and icons come back when Mural quits.

• Release hardening: in-app dialogs replace browser prompts that never worked in Electron; delete confirmations; unsaved-work recovery after a crash; undo after dragging, with slider bursts merged; Save no longer cancels running AI jobs; deleted wallpapers are cleaned out of playlists; crash handlers in every process and a self-healing wallpaper renderer; atomic settings and library writes.
• Drag and drop pictures or videos onto the canvas to add them (several pictures become a sequence).
• Shortcuts: Ctrl+D duplicate, arrow keys nudge (Shift = 10 px), Escape deselects, Ctrl+[ / ] reorder.
• The editor remembers its window size, position and maximized state. Moving a Cover or Fit layer now sticks.

• Multi-path animations: give one picture several AI paths. Playback picks a path, plays it out and back to frame 1, rests, then picks another. Random or in-order, a pause on frame 1, and generated holds (idle motion that stays in place) for the rests. Paths generate in the background while the layer keeps playing.
• Desktop icons: a small button in the bottom-right corner of the desktop hides and shows all icons with one click. Arrange icons around the wallpaper moves them into a tidy block on the calmest side of the picture, away from widgets and the subject; it can run on every apply, and Restore puts them back.
• The current viewport is always outlined and labelled on the canvas. The floating layer action bar is gone in favour of the right-click menu, corner handles and properties panel.