DeepSeek Review: Features, Pricing & Alternatives

What is DeepSeek?

DeepSeek is an AI chatbot from DeepSeek, an AI research company based in Hangzhou, China. Its app launched in January 2025 and briefly became the most downloaded free app on the US App Store, after its R1 reasoning model matched leading Western models at a fraction of the training cost.

In April 2026 DeepSeek released its V4 model family, including V4 Pro and the faster V4 Flash, with very long context windows. The DeepSeek app remains free, and its API is among the cheapest available, which is why many developers use DeepSeek models inside their own products.

DeepSeek also publishes many of its models with open weights, so they can be run on your own hardware or through other providers.

Key features of DeepSeek

• Free access to strong modelsUse DeepSeek’s latest models in the app without a subscription.
• DeepThink reasoningTurn on reasoning mode to see step-by-step thinking for maths, logic and coding problems.
• Web searchAnswers can include results from the web.
• File uploadsUpload documents and images to extract text and ask questions.
• Open-weight modelsMany DeepSeek models can be downloaded and self-hosted, giving full control over data.
• Low-cost APIDevelopers can access DeepSeek models at very low per-token prices.

Who is DeepSeek best for?

• Students who want free help with maths and coding.
• Developers who want cheap API access or self-hosted open models.
• Budget-conscious users who want strong reasoning without a subscription.

DeepSeek pricing (October 2026)

The consumer app is free. Costs only apply if you use the developer API.

DeepSeek pros and cons

How to get started with DeepSeek

1. Go to chat.deepseek.com or install the official app and create an account.
2. Turn on DeepThink for complex problems.
3. Avoid entering sensitive personal or business data in the hosted app.
4. Developers can create an API key on the DeepSeek platform or run open-weight models locally.

DeepSeek vs alternatives

For a free all-rounder with more features, try the free plans of ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini. Mistral Vibe is a European, privacy-focused option.

Read our guide to using AI safely before sharing data with any chatbot.

Our verdict: is DeepSeek worth it?

DeepSeek FAQs

Pricing and features change often. Details on this page were last reviewed in October 2026. Always confirm current plans on the official DeepSeek website.