ChatGPT vs DeepSeek
A side-by-side look at scores, pricing and features — with RECATOOLS' ASEAN-aware verdict for each.
ChatGPT
The most widely used AI assistant — now on GPT-5.6, from OpenAI
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DeepSeek
China's frontier open-weight LLM lab — now shipping the V4 family at a...
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| RECATOOLS Score | 9.2 / 10 | 8.2 / 10 |
| Capability | ||
| Value for money | ||
| Ease of use | ||
| ASEAN readiness | ||
| API quality | ||
| Pricing | Freemium | Open Source |
| Free tier | GPT-5-class model with daily message limits | Free access at chat.deepseek.com; open weights self-hostable |
| Paid from | $20/month (Plus); free, Go, Pro, and Team/Enterprise tiers also offered | V4-Flash $0.14/$0.28; V4-Pro $0.435/$0.87 per 1M tokens (now permanent, not promo) |
| Has API | ✓ | ✓ |
| Open source | ✗ | ✓ |
| Free to use | ✓ | ✓ |
| Users | ~900M weekly active users (1B+ monthly active app users as of mid-2026) | ~130M monthly active users (late 2025) |
| Founded | 2022 | 2023 |
| Maker | OpenAI | High-Flyer |
| Verdict | ChatGPT is still the default AI assistant, and the July 2026 release of GPT-5.6 (Sol, Terra and Luna tiers) keeps the flagship current across writing, coding and agentic work. No rival matches its feature breadth — voice... |
DeepSeek is the Chinese lab whose open-weight models repeatedly shock the market by matching far costlier frontier systems at a fraction of the price. The 2026 V4 family (V4-Pro and the cheaper V4-Flash, both 1M-context)... |
| Full review → | Full review → |
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Comparisons cover up to 4 tools. Scores are RECATOOLS editorial assessments; verify current pricing on each vendor's site.