OpenAI vs DeepSeek
API pricing and model line-up compared · Prices checked 12 August 2026
DeepSeek has the lower entry price: DeepSeek-R1-Distill-8B at $0.109 per million tokens blended, against GPT-4.1 nano at $0.190 on OpenAI, roughly 1.7× cheaper to start.
At the top of the range OpenAI goes higher: o1 at $28.50 per million tokens against DeepSeek-V4-Pro at $2.26. OpenAI offers more choice in our catalogue: 17 text models against 11. OpenAI offers the larger maximum context window, 1,050,000 tokens against 1,000,000.
Catalogue side by side
| Metric | OpenAI | DeepSeek |
|---|---|---|
| Models tracked | 17 | 11 |
| Cheapest model | GPT-4.1 nano · $0.190/M | DeepSeek-R1-Distill-8B · $0.109/M |
| Most expensive model | o1 · $28.50/M | DeepSeek-V4-Pro · $2.26/M |
| Top-tier input / output | $5.00 / $30.00 | $0.140 / $0.280 |
| Largest context window | 1,050,000 | 1,000,000 |
| Models with public benchmarks | 14 of 17 | 9 of 11 |
| Founded | 2015 | 2023 |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, USA | Hangzhou, China |
Counts cover text-generation models in our curated catalogue, excluding retired SKUs, embeddings and non-text products. Blended rates weight input at 70 per cent and output at 30 per cent; how that is calculated.
About each provider
OpenAI
Maker of ChatGPT, GPT and the o-series reasoning models. Broadest API surface in the industry: chat, vision, audio, embeddings, image generation.
Top of the line: GPT-5.6 Sol at $5.00 input / $30.00 output per million tokens, 1,050,000 context.
DeepSeek
Open-weights frontier from a Chinese hedge-fund-backed lab. R1 reset price/performance expectations for reasoning models.
Top of the line: DeepSeek-V4-Flash at $0.140 input / $0.280 output per million tokens, 1,000,000 context.
Frequently asked questions
Is OpenAI or DeepSeek cheaper?
It depends which tier you need. DeepSeek has the lower entry price, but both run a range from budget to frontier models, so the fair comparison is tier against tier rather than vendor against vendor. Price the specific models you would actually call; the table above shows each side’s floor and ceiling.
Should I use OpenAI or DeepSeek?
Neither wins outright. Shortlist by the capability tier your workload needs, then compare the specific models on price, context window and benchmark evidence. Multi-vendor setups are common precisely because the cheapest adequate model for one task is rarely the same vendor as for another.
Where do these OpenAI and DeepSeek prices come from?
Each provider’s published rates, as tracked in our pricing index. Blended figures weight input at 70 per cent and output at 30 per cent and are calculated comparison metrics rather than published prices. Counts cover text-generation models only, excluding retired SKUs, embeddings and non-text products.
Go deeper
Other provider matchups
Figures are recomputed on every deploy from the curated catalogue. Prices checked 12 August 2026.