14 models in this directory cost $1 or less per million input tokens. DeepSeek V4-Pro is the most capable of them ($0.435/1M), Mistral Small 3.1 is the absolute cheapest at $0.1/1M, and GPT-5.6 Luna gives you the largest context window (1.05M tokens) at this price level.
The shortest way to see the safest default, the lower-cost option, and the specialist pick before you read deeper.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is the safest overall answer here when you want the strongest default instead of the lowest list price.
Grok 4.5 is the lower-cost option to start with when you still need useful output at scale.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is the better pick when response speed matters more than maximum reasoning depth.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is the most capable model under $1/1M — $0.435/1M input, $0.87/1M output, 1M context.
Mistral Small 3.1 is the absolute cheapest at $0.1/1M input — 100x cheaper than Claude Fable 5.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is the strongest budget coding pick (coding score 93/100).
Choose DeepSeek V4-Pro as your budget default — the best capability-per-dollar in this price band.
Choose Mistral Small 3.1 for very high-volume tasks like classification, tagging, and extraction.
Route hard tasks to a premium model and keep everything else here — a two-tier setup usually cuts spend 60–80%.
Switch the scoring lens to see whether the top answer changes when you care more about cost, speed, or long-document work.
DeepSeek / Budget / Aug 6, 2026
Best open-weights flagship — near-frontier coding at a tenth of the price.
Ranks models by the broadest mix of coding, writing, research, and long-context usefulness.
You need vision input, verified agentic performance, or predictable pricing (surge pricing and an announced increase loom).
The fastest way to see where the recommendation shifts when your priority changes.
Best open-weights flagship — near-frontier coding at a tenth of the price.
Best budget model from a frontier lab — near-frontier scores at commodity price.
GPT-4o-class coding quality at under $0.30/1M — the best value in the directory.
Best agentic capability per dollar in the directory.
Open-source o1-class reasoning at a fraction of the cost.
Fastest budget multimodal model — 350 tokens/sec at Lite pricing.
Value coding specialist — 1T MoE agentic coder at budget prices.
Best cheap AI for broad day-to-day work — now with 1M context.
80.6% SWE-bench Verified (self-reported) — reported as tied with Gemini 3.1 Pro
93.5% LiveCodeBench and Codeforces 3206 — elite competitive-coding results
1M context with 384K max output at $0.87/1M output — an order of magnitude cheaper than closed frontier models
Independent harnesses report much lower agentic scores than the self-reported numbers; trails GPT-5.6 and Opus-class on hard agentic evals
Peak-hour surge pricing doubles rates, a price increase is announced, and it's text-only (no vision)
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DeepSeek V4-Pro — $0.435/1M input tokens with the highest capability average in this price band. Best open-weights flagship — near-frontier coding at a tenth of the price.
Mistral Small 3.1 at $0.1/1M input and $0.3/1M output. It handles ultra-high-volume classification well despite the price.
DeepSeek V4-Pro, with a coding score of 93/100 at $0.435/1M input.
Budget models trail flagships on hard reasoning, nuanced writing, and complex multi-step coding. Claude Fable 5, the current capability leader, scores 99/100 on average vs 86/100 for DeepSeek V4-Pro — use cheap models for volume, not for your hardest work.
Yes — usually 3–5x more. DeepSeek V4-Pro charges $0.435/1M input but $0.87/1M output, so long responses drive the real bill. Our API cost calculator models both sides.