Claude Opus 5 vs DeepSeek V4 Pro
Side-by-side comparison of API pricing, specs, benchmarks, and capabilities
DeepSeek V4 Pro is 80.2% cheaper on blended cost ($1.98 vs $10.00/Mtok) — note: different model classes (mid tier vs flagship)
| Specification |
by Anthropic
|
by DeepSeek
4 providers:
DeepSeek $1.32/$3.96
Fireworks $1.32/$3.96
Together $1.32/$3.96
DeepInfra $1.30/$2.60
|
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Status | Current flagship | Current mid tier |
| Released | ||
| Pricing per million tokens | ||
| Input | $5.00/Mtok | $1.32/Mtok |
| Output | $25.00/Mtok | $3.96/Mtok |
| Blended avg | $10.00/Mtok | $1.98/Mtok |
| Cached input | $0.500/Mtok | $0.044/Mtok |
| Price basis | — | DeepSeek bills this model at TWO rates depending on the hour. The tracked figure is the PEAK rate: $1.32 input / $0.044 cached input / $3.96 output per 1M tokens. Off-peak is exactly half: $0.66 / $0.022 / $1.98. Peak hours are 01:00-04:00 and 06:00-10:00 UTC, Monday through Friday; every other hour, and all of Saturday and Sunday, is off-peak. Peak is the headline here because DeepSeek defines off-peak as half of peak rather than the other way round, so peak is the list rate, and because a caller who does not schedule around the clock needs the published number to be a ceiling rather than a floor. Halve it for a workload that runs entirely outside those hours. Until 16:00 UTC on 2026-08-16 this model billed a single flat $0.435 / $0.003625 / $0.87. These rates were announced on 2026-09-10 to stop being purchasable at 2026-09-14T04:00Z; DeepSeek withdrew that on 2026-09-11, stating the billing method is unchanged past 2026-09-14, so they remain the live rates. |
| Specifications | ||
| Context window | 1M tokens | 1M tokens |
| Parameters | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| Speed (TPS) | — | — |
| Modalities | ||
| Input |
textimage
|
text
|
| Benchmarks source: Vellum LLM Leaderboard | ||
| Avg benchmark score | 84.2 | 73.5 |
| Perf / dollar | 8.4 | 37.1 |
| SWE-Bench Verified | 97 | 80.6 vendor |
| BrowseComp | 90.8 | 83.4 |
| Humanity's Last Exam | 64.7 | 48.2 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 90.1 |
| LiveCodeBench | — | 93.5 |
| MCP Atlas | — | 73.6 |
| ARC-AGI 2 | — | 30 |
| AIME 2025 | — | 75 |
| MMMLU | — | 82 |
| BFCL | — | 72 |
| HumanEval | — | 80.6 |
| MATH 500 | — | 80 |
| AutoBench | 26 | — |
| Independent composite scores each on its own scale — not part of the average above | ||
| AA Intelligence Index | 50.7 | 36.3 |
| AA Agentic Index | 56.2 | 42.3 |
| AA-Omniscience Index (−100–100) | 37.1 | 0.8 |
| GDPval-AA v2 | 1735.1 ELO | 1493.3 ELO |
| LMSYS Chatbot Arena | — | 1457.5 ELO |
| Providers | ||
| Available from |
Anthropic — $5.00/$25.00/Mtok
|
DeepSeek — $1.32/$3.96/Mtok
Fireworks — $1.32/$3.96/Mtok
Together — $1.32/$3.96/Mtok
DeepInfra — $1.30/$2.60/Mtok
|
Cost at scale
1M tokens · 50/50 input/output| Volume | Claude Opus 5 | DeepSeek V4 Pro | Savings |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1M tokens | $10 | $1.98 | $8.02 (80.2%) |
| 10M tokens | $100 | $19.8 | $80.2 (80.2%) |
| 100M tokens | $1000 | $198 | $802 (80.2%) |
| 1000M tokens | $10000 | $1980 | $8020 (80.2%) |
When to pick which
distilled from the pricing and spec data above
Pick Claude Opus 5 if…
- raw capability matters more than price: 84.2 vs 73.5 average benchmark score
Pick DeepSeek V4 Pro if…
- cost dominates: $1.98/Mtok blended vs $10.00 — 80.2% less on the same 50/50 token mix
- your workload re-reads context (agents, RAG, long chats): cached input costs $0.044/Mtok — 97% off its list input price
- provider flexibility: available from 4 providers, so you can price-shop hosts or fail over
Price movement
recorded changes since we began tracking each model · last checked| Model | Changes | Latest move | Old → new $/M |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Opus 5 | 0 | — no move | Stable since we began tracking — no change recorded |
| DeepSeek V4 Pro | 1 | price rise on | $0.435/$0.87 → $1.32/$3.96/Mtok |
Only DeepSeek V4 Pro has changed price since we began tracking; Claude Opus 5 has held steady.
See all recent price moves →
MODELPRICEWATCH.COM · 2026-09-12
Try DeepSeek V4 Pro on DeepSeek
The cheaper option here — DeepSeek V4 Pro costs $1.98/Mtok blended on DeepSeek.
Summary
Claude Opus 5 by Anthropic costs $5.00/Mtok input and $25.00/Mtok output, with a 1M-token context window. It supports text, image input.
DeepSeek V4 Pro by DeepSeek costs $1.32/Mtok input and $3.96/Mtok output, with a 1M-token context window. It supports text input and is available from 4 providers.
On a blended cost basis, DeepSeek V4 Pro is 80.2% cheaper than Claude Opus 5.
On benchmarks, Claude Opus 5 scores higher (84.2 vs 73.5) on average. In terms of value, DeepSeek V4 Pro has better performance per dollar (37.1 vs 8.4).
Note: Pricing is per million tokens. Actual costs vary with usage patterns, prompt caching, and batch discounts. Always verify against official provider pricing pages.
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