GPT-4o-class coding quality at under $0.30/1M — the best value in the directory.
87
Coding
74
Writing
80
Research
10
Images
96
Value
62
Long Context
Published benchmarks
42%
SWE-bench
1,305
Arena Elo
88.5%
MMLU
59.1%
GPQA
90.2%
MATH
Use this when
Coding, reasoning, and general tasks at extreme cost efficiency
Skip this if
Your team has data sovereignty requirements or needs enterprise-grade reliability guarantees.
Pricing
$0.27/1M in
$1.10/1M out
→0%since Jun 2026
Context
128k tokens
Speed
Fast
DeepSeek V3 shocked the market on release. At this price point with this capability level, it forces a reconsideration of when premium models are actually worth it.
GPT-4o class coding and reasoning at under $0.30/1M input tokens
Open-source weights available for self-hosting
Strong performance on HumanEval and coding benchmarks relative to price
Weaknesses
Chinese-origin model raises data sovereignty concerns for some enterprise teams
Slightly weaker on nuanced English writing tone compared to Claude and GPT
Less reliable for complex multi-step agentic workflows vs frontier models
Real-world use cases
What people actually use DeepSeek V3 for.
High-volume code generation and review pipelines where GPT-4o-class quality is needed at budget pricing
Research synthesis and document analysis at scale without premium model costs
General-purpose assistant workflows where open-source is preferred over proprietary models
How DeepSeek V3 compares
The nearest models people weigh against it, and what actually separates them.
vs Claude 3.5 Sonnet — Against Claude 3.5 Sonnet (Anthropic), DeepSeek V3 runs about 96% cheaper per token, gives up 1.6x on context and answers faster. Take DeepSeek V3 unless you specifically need what Claude 3.5 Sonnet does better.
vs Claude Fable 5 — Against Claude Fable 5 (Anthropic), DeepSeek V3 runs about 98% cheaper per token, gives up 7.8x on context and answers faster. Take DeepSeek V3 unless you specifically need what Claude Fable 5 does better.
vs Claude Fable 5.1 — Against Claude Fable 5.1 (Anthropic), DeepSeek V3 runs about 98% cheaper per token, gives up 7.8x on context and answers faster. Take DeepSeek V3 unless you specifically need what Claude Fable 5.1 does better.
Price History
DeepSeek V3 pricing over time
→0% since Jun 12
90 data points · tracked daily since Jun 12, 2026
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Start using DeepSeek V3
Coding, reasoning, and general tasks at extreme cost efficiency. Start free — no card required.
Claude 3.5 Sonnet is Anthropic's mid-cycle flagship model, balancing strong reasoning, coding, and instruction-following with a 200K context window. It sits between Haiku and Opus in Anthropic's lineup, offering near-flagship quality at a lower cost than top-tier models.
Verdict
One of the best models for coding and complex instruction-following, but its premium pricing demands premium use cases.
Quality score
81%
Pricing
$6.00/1M in
$30.00/1M out
Speed
Balanced
3/5 speed
Context
200k tokens
Pricing at $6 input / $30 output per million tokens is significantly higher than GPT-4o ($2.50/$10). Best accessed via Anthropic API or Amazon Bedrock. Claude 3.5 Sonnet (October 2024 version) supersedes the June 2024 release with improved performance.
Anthropic's new Mythos-class flagship and the most capable coding model anyone can use — 80.3% SWE-Bench Pro, an 11-point jump over Opus 4.8. 1M context, 128K output, native parallel subagents. Released June 9, 2026.
Verdict
New global #1 — 80.3% SWE-Bench Pro, the most capable model generally available.
Quality score
98%
Pricing
$10.00/1M in
$50.00/1M out
Speed
Deliberate
2/5 speed
Context
1M tokens
Launched June 9, 2026 as the public, Mythos-class release. Available on the Claude API, Microsoft Foundry, and Google Vertex AI. Free for all users until June 22, 2026. Same underlying model as Claude Mythos 5, with safeguards that block specific high-risk cyber responses.
Coding leaderSWE-Bench Pro #1Mythos-classParallel subagentsAgenticLong contextPremiumNew
Best for
The hardest coding tasks, autonomous multi-step agents, and frontier-grade reasoning
Anthropic's September 1, 2026 frontier release and the new capability ceiling for coding, agents, and scientific work. Base pricing is unchanged at $10/$50, but cache reads dropped 75% to $0.25/1M — roughly 25% cheaper on typical workloads and up to 45% cheaper on agentic ones. 1M context, 128K output, adaptive thinking always on.
Verdict
New frontier leader — better than Fable 5 on every published benchmark, and cheaper to run.
Quality score
98%
Pricing
$10.00/1M in
$50.00/1M out
Speed
Deliberate
2/5 speed
Context
1M tokens
Released September 1, 2026 alongside Claude Mythos 5.1, the first update to the Mythos-class line since Fable 5 on June 9. API ID claude-fable-5-1; generally available on the Claude API, Amazon Bedrock, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Foundry. Published launch numbers (Fable 5.1 / Fable 5 / Opus 5 / GPT-5.6 Sol): Terminal-Bench-Science 0.1 52.6 / 24.7 / 29.0 / 22.4; Terminal-Bench 4.0 55.8 / 42.0 / 52.3 / 37.3; CursorBench 3.2.0 73.4 / 70.5 / 70.0 / 67.2; AutomationBench 31.4 / 17.1 / 26.9 / 19.6; OSWorld 2.0 strict 41.7 / 36.1 / 39.6; Humanity's Last Exam (no tools) 60.9 / 57.8 / 56.6; GDPval-AA v2 1853 / 1723 / 1824 / 1711. GDPval-AA v2 is rescaled from the v1 numbers quoted on the Fable 5 page and is not directly comparable to them.
DeepSeek V3 costs $0.27 per million input tokens and $1.1 per million output tokens on the API. A month of 10M input and 2M output tokens runs about $4.90 at list price, before any batch or caching discounts.
What is DeepSeek V3 best for?
DeepSeek V3 is best for coding, reasoning, and general tasks at extreme cost efficiency. It is a strong fit when that workflow matters more than the tradeoffs around budget pricing and fast speed.
When should I avoid DeepSeek V3?
Your team has data sovereignty requirements or needs enterprise-grade reliability guarantees.
What is a cheaper alternative to DeepSeek V3?
GPT-5.1-Codex-Max (OpenAI) at $1.25/1M/1M input against DeepSeek V3's $0.27/1M/1M. The strongest choice for serious software engineering work, provided you can absorb the output-side pricing. Compare it first if DeepSeek V3's pricing is the thing stopping you.
What is a faster alternative to DeepSeek V3?
Claude 3.5 Sonnet — balanced against DeepSeek V3's fast, with 200k tokens of context. Worth the swap when response time is what your users notice rather than the last few points of reasoning depth.
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