DeepSeek V4-Pro wins on coding (93 vs 89) and price ($0.435 vs $0.75/1M input). For most workflows, Gemini 3.7 Flash is the stronger default — 80.8% swe-bench verified at introductory flash pricing.
The shortest way to see the safest default, the lower-cost option, and the specialist pick before you read deeper.
Gemini 3.7 Flash is the safest overall answer here when you want the strongest default instead of the lowest list price.
Mistral: Mistral Nemo is the lower-cost option to start with when you still need useful output at scale.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is the better pick when response speed matters more than maximum reasoning depth.
DeepSeek V4-Pro leads on coding with a score of 93 vs 89 for Gemini 3.7 Flash.
Gemini 3.7 Flash has the larger context window: 1.048576M vs 1M for DeepSeek V4-Pro.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is cheaper at $0.435/1M input tokens vs $0.75/1M for Gemini 3.7 Flash.
Go with Gemini 3.7 Flash if you want one model to handle coding and reasoning — it targets high-volume coding and long-context work at introductory Flash pricing.
Choose DeepSeek V4-Pro when your work is mostly frontier-level coding and reasoning on a budget — that is the workload it was tuned for.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is the more cost-efficient option at $0.435/1M input — Gemini 3.7 Flash costs 2x more per input token, so the gap is worth taking seriously wherever token volume rather than peak quality drives the bill.
Switch the scoring lens to see whether the top answer changes when you care more about cost, speed, or long-document work.
Google / Balanced / Aug 27, 2026
80.8% SWE-bench Verified at introductory Flash pricing.
Ranks models by the broadest mix of coding, writing, research, and long-context usefulness.
You are planning 2027 spend and need price certainty — the introductory rate expires December 31, 2026.
The fastest way to see where the recommendation shifts when your priority changes.
80.8% SWE-bench Verified at introductory Flash pricing.
Best open-weights flagship — near-frontier coding at a tenth of the price.
Every figure below is the provider's list price or a published capability score — the same numbers the recommendation on this page is built from.
| Model | Input | Output | Est. month | Context | Speed | Coding | Writing | Research |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gemini 3.7 FlashGoogle | $0.75/1M | $3.75/1M | $15 | 1.0M tokens | Fast | 89 | 82 | 85 |
| DeepSeek V4-ProDeepSeek | $0.43/1M | $0.87/1M | $6.09 | 1M tokens | Balanced | 93 | 80 | 85 |
Capability scores are out of 100 and reflect our own weighting of published benchmarks and production signals — see how we evaluate models. “Est. month” assumes 10M input and 2M output tokens at list price, with no batch or caching discounts applied, so treat it as a ceiling.
What each one is genuinely good at, where it falls down, and the situations we would steer you away from it — not just the headline score.
Google's fastest-moving coding workhorse — 80.8% on SWE-bench Verified at half the price of Gemini 3.6 Flash, shipped just three weeks after it.
You are planning 2027 spend and need price certainty — the introductory rate expires December 31, 2026.
The best coding score per dollar in Google's lineup right now — 80.8% SWE-bench Verified at $0.75/1M input. Budget on the post-January 2027 price of $1.50/$7.50 if you are signing anything long-term.
Released August 13, 2026, only three weeks after Gemini 3.6 Flash. Introductory pricing of $0.75/$3.75 runs through December 31, 2026; on January 1, 2027 it doubles to $1.50/$7.50, which is exactly Gemini 3.6 Flash's rate.
DeepSeek's 1.6T-parameter (49B active) MoE flagship with hybrid sparse attention — near-frontier coding and reasoning at roughly a tenth of closed-rival pricing, MIT-licensed open weights.
You need vision input, verified agentic performance, or predictable pricing (surge pricing and an announced increase loom).
The open-weights frontier flagship of 2026. Self-reported numbers flatter it and independent agentic scores land lower, but even discounted it's the most capability per dollar in the directory's upper tier — with MIT-licensed weights.
Open-weight preview April 24; GA ~July 20, 2026. Off-peak pricing verified on api-docs.deepseek.com; Beijing-business-hours surge doubles it. Legacy deepseek-chat/reasoner endpoints retired July 24, 2026.
UseRightAI recommendations are based on practical decision factors people actually feel in day-to-day use.
Newsletter
Useful if you care about ranking shifts, pricing changes, or a better recommendation appearing in this decision path.
No spam. Useful updates only. Affiliate disclosures always clearly labeled.
Gemini 3.7 Flash wins on more of the categories we score — coding, reasoning, long context — so it is the better default of the two. DeepSeek V4-Pro is the better pick when your work is mostly frontier-level coding and reasoning on a budget. Neither is universally "better": Gemini 3.7 Flash is aimed at high-volume coding and long-context work at introductory Flash pricing, DeepSeek V4-Pro at frontier-level coding and reasoning on a budget.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is cheaper at $0.435/1M input and $0.87/1M output. Gemini 3.7 Flash costs $0.75/1M input and $3.75/1M output.
Gemini 3.7 Flash has the larger context window at 1.048576M tokens vs DeepSeek V4-Pro's 1M. For large document analysis, Gemini 3.7 Flash is the stronger pick.
DeepSeek V4-Pro is better for coding with a score of 93 vs Gemini 3.7 Flash's 89 (out of 100). Claude Fable 5 is the overall coding leader in this directory at 100/100.
Gemini 3.7 Flash is faster with a fast speed rating (score: 4) vs DeepSeek V4-Pro's balanced rating (score: 3). Speed matters most for interactive and high-throughput work; for batch jobs the DeepSeek V4-Pro latency penalty is usually invisible.
The $0.75/$3.75 launch price is introductory — it doubles to $1.50/$7.50 on January 1, 2027. Still short of Claude Opus 5 (96%) and GPT-5.6 Sol (96.2%) on SWE-bench Verified for the hardest coding work. Avoid it if you are planning 2027 spend and need price certainty — the introductory rate expires December 31, 2026. That is the main case for looking at DeepSeek V4-Pro instead.
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). Avoid it if you need vision input, verified agentic performance, or predictable pricing (surge pricing and an announced increase loom). Against Gemini 3.7 Flash specifically, the gap shows up most on coding (89 vs 93).
Take a moderate workload of 10M input and 2M output tokens a month. Gemini 3.7 Flash runs $15.00 (at $0.75/1M in and $3.75/1M out); DeepSeek V4-Pro runs $6.09 (at $0.435/1M in and $0.87/1M out). That is a $8.91/month difference — DeepSeek V4-Pro is the cheaper of the two at this volume, and the gap scales linearly as you send more. Output tokens dominate the bill on both, so prompt length matters far less than response length.
Yes, and for most teams that beats picking one. A common split is Gemini 3.7 Flash for high-volume coding and long-context work at introductory Flash pricing, with DeepSeek V4-Pro handling frontier-level coding and reasoning on a budget. Routing high-volume, low-stakes calls to DeepSeek V4-Pro at $0.435/1M and reserving Gemini 3.7 Flash for the hard cases is usually the cheapest arrangement that does not cost you quality.