DeepSeek vs Yi

Detailed comparison across 10 dimensions

Winner: Yi

Yi clearly comes out ahead of DeepSeek on Staquest's weighted six-dimension score. Yi has a free tier; DeepSeek does not.

Quick Overview

Overview	DeepSeekOpen-source Chinese foundation models with strong reasoning.	YiKai-Fu Lee's bilingual AI model with strong reasoning.
Type	ai tool	ai tool
Company	DeepSeek	01.AI
Free Tier
Has API
Open Source
Trending	Stable	Stable
Industries	DevelopmentData & AnalyticsAI & Machine LearningEducation & EdTech	DevelopmentData & AnalyticsAI & Machine Learning
Categories	ai-foundation-modelsai-chatbot	ai-foundation-models
Website	Visit	Visit

Dimension Scores

Winners by Dimension

Overall Winner

DeepSeek: 5.8Yi: 6.8(+1.0 pts)

Pricing Value

Tie15% weight

DeepSeek

8.0

Free Tier

Yi10% weight

DeepSeek

2.0

7.5

Scalability

Tie10% weight

DeepSeek

4.8

Integrations

Tie10% weight

DeepSeek

8.0

Community

Tie5% weight

DeepSeek

3.1

Open Source

Tie5% weight

DeepSeek

7.0

Pricing Comparison

DeepSeek

DeepSeek API–

usage based

Input Tokens (Cache Hit): $0.028 per 1M tokens
Input Tokens (Cache Miss): $0.28 per 1M tokens
Output Tokens: $0.42 per 1M tokens
Automatic context caching
Unified rates for deepseek-chat and deepseek-reasoner

Yi

Open Source

Free

open source

Access to base models (Yi-6B, Yi-9B, Yi-34B, etc.)
Self-hosting capabilities
Community support

Frequently asked questions

Is DeepSeek or Yi better?

On Staquest's weighted six-dimension scoring, Yi comes out ahead overall, though DeepSeek can be the better fit depending on your priorities — see the dimension-by-dimension breakdown above.

Does DeepSeek or Yi have a free tier?

Yi offers a free tier; DeepSeek does not currently list one.

View DeepSeek View Yi