A professional headshot session runs $150 to $600 and takes two weeks. AI takes minutes. Here is the honest comparison — including the four jobs where the photographer still wins.
Most people searching for a headshot are not choosing between two AI tools. They are choosing between booking a photographer and not bothering, and the third option — generating one — has only recently become good enough to belong in the comparison.
This is that comparison, written by people who make one of the tools. Where the photographer wins, we say so.
That gap is the entire reason this category exists. It is also not the whole story.