DeepSeek API Pricing (March 2026) — V3.2 & R1 Reasoner Costs
DeepSeek API pricing (March 2026): V3.2 at $0.28/$0.42 per 1M tokens, R1 at $0.50/$2.18. Cheapest LLM API. Full cost table, free tier, and comparison with GPT and Claude.
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DeepSeek API Pricing — March 2026
Last updated: March 2, 2026 No pricing changes since February 2026.
TL;DR — DeepSeek API Prices (March 2026)
- DeepSeek V3.2 (Chat): $0.28/$0.42 per 1M input/output tokens
- DeepSeek V3.2 (Reasoner): $0.28/$0.42 per 1M tokens
- Cache Hit: $0.028 per 1M input tokens (90% off)
DeepSeek V3.2 replaced both V3 and R1 with a unified model that handles both chat and reasoning at the same price.
DeepSeek V3.2 (Current)
| Model | Context | Input / 1M tokens | Output / 1M tokens | Cached Input |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| deepseek-chat (V3.2) | 128K | $0.28 | $0.42 | $0.028 |
| deepseek-reasoner (V3.2) | 128K | $0.28 | $0.42 | $0.028 |
Max output: 8K tokens (chat), 64K tokens (reasoner).
Previous Models (Deprecated)
| Model | Input / 1M tokens | Output / 1M tokens |
|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek V3 | $0.14 | $0.28 |
| DeepSeek R1 | $0.55 | $2.19 |
Why DeepSeek is Popular
- Still very cheap — $0.28/$0.42 is a fraction of GPT-5 or Claude pricing
- Unified model — same price for chat and reasoning
- 90% cache discount — $0.028/M for repeated context
- Open weights — can self-host
Related
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