Automatically generating a hardware image based on programming model types includes determining by a design tool, types of programming models used in specifications of blocks of a circuit design, in response to a user control input to generate a hardware image to configure a programmable integrated circuit (IC). The design tool can generate a model-type compiler script for each of the types of programming models. Each compiler script initiates compilation of blocks having specifications based on one of the types of programming model into an accelerator representation. The design tool can generate a build script configured to execute the compiler scripts and link the accelerator representations into linked accelerator representations. Execution of the build script builds a hardware image from the linked accelerator representations for configuring the programmable IC to implement a circuit according to the circuit design.