LLM Reference

DeepSeek V4 Pro vs GPT-4o-mini Search Preview

DeepSeek V4 Pro (2026) and GPT-4o-mini Search Preview (2025) are frontier reasoning models from DeepSeek and OpenAI. DeepSeek V4 Pro ships a 1m-token context window, while GPT-4o-mini Search Preview ships a 128k-token context window. On pricing, GPT-4o-mini Search Preview costs $0.15/1M input tokens versus $0.43/1M for the alternative. This comparison covers specs, pricing, API access, capabilities, benchmarks, input and output token costs, and production fit for coding and agent workloads.

GPT-4o-mini Search Preview is ~190% cheaper at $0.15/1M; pay for DeepSeek V4 Pro only for reasoning depth.

Decision scorecard

Local evidence first
SignalDeepSeek V4 ProGPT-4o-mini Search Preview
Best forreasoning-heavy apps, tool-calling agents, and long-context analysisprovider-routed production
Decision fitCoding, RAG, and AgentsRAG, Long context, and Classification
Context window1m128k
Cheapest output$0.87/1M tokens$0.60/1M tokens
Provider routes5 tracked2 tracked
Shared benchmarks0 shared0 shared

Decision tradeoffs

Choose DeepSeek V4 Pro when...
  • DeepSeek V4 Pro has the larger context window for long prompts, retrieval packs, or transcript analysis.
  • DeepSeek V4 Pro has broader tracked provider coverage for fallback and route flexibility.
  • DeepSeek V4 Pro uniquely exposes Reasoning and JSON / Tool use in local model data.
  • Local decision data tags DeepSeek V4 Pro for Coding, RAG, and Agents.
Choose GPT-4o-mini Search Preview when...
  • GPT-4o-mini Search Preview has the lower cheapest tracked output price at $0.60/1M tokens.
  • Local decision data tags GPT-4o-mini Search Preview for RAG, Long context, and Classification.

Monthly cost at traffic

Estimate token spend from the cheapest tracked input and output route or tier on this page.

Lower estimate GPT-4o-mini Search Preview

DeepSeek V4 Pro

$566

Cheapest tracked route/tier: DeepSeek Platform

GPT-4o-mini Search Preview

$270

Cheapest tracked route/tier: OpenRouter

Estimated monthly gap: $296. Batch, cache, alternate speed tiers, and negotiated pricing are excluded from this local estimate.

Switch friction

DeepSeek V4 Pro -> GPT-4o-mini Search Preview
  • Provider overlap exists on OpenRouter and Vercel AI Gateway; start route-level A/B tests there.
  • GPT-4o-mini Search Preview is $0.27/1M tokens lower on cheapest tracked output pricing before cache, batch, or negotiated discounts.
  • Check replacement coverage for Reasoning and JSON / Tool use before moving production traffic.
GPT-4o-mini Search Preview -> DeepSeek V4 Pro
  • Provider overlap exists on OpenRouter and Vercel AI Gateway; start route-level A/B tests there.
  • DeepSeek V4 Pro is $0.27/1M tokens higher on cheapest tracked output pricing, so quality gains need to justify the spend.
  • DeepSeek V4 Pro adds Reasoning and JSON / Tool use in local capability data.

Specs

Specification
Released2026-04-242025-02-26
Context window1m128k
Parameters1.6T
ArchitectureMixture of ExpertsDecoder Only
LicenseMITOSI-approvedProprietary
OpennessOpen sourceProprietary
WeightsAvailableNot released
CodeUnknownUnknown
Commercial useCommercial use: permittedCommercial use: conditional
Knowledge cutoff-2023-10

Pricing and availability

Pricing attributeDeepSeek V4 ProGPT-4o-mini Search Preview
Input price$0.43/1M tokens$0.15/1M tokens
Output price$0.87/1M tokens$0.60/1M tokens
Providers

Capabilities

CapabilityDeepSeek V4 ProGPT-4o-mini Search Preview
VisionNoNo
MultimodalNoNo
ReasoningYesNo
JSON / Tool useYesNo
Structured outputsYesYes
Code executionNoNo
IDE integrationNoNo
Computer useNoNo
Parallel agentsNoNo

Benchmarks

No shared benchmark scores are currently available for this pair.

Continue comparing

Last reviewed: 2026-06-29. Data sourced from public model cards and provider documentation.