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DeepSeek-Coder-V2 vs DeepSeek-V3

A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.

Updated

DeepSeek-Coder-V2 specs · DeepSeek-V3 specs
Verdict by category
  • PriceDeepSeek-V3

    DeepSeek-V3 publishes pricing ($1.10 / 1M output tokens) while DeepSeek-Coder-V2 does not.

  • Context windowTie

    Both ship a 128K-token context window.

  • BenchmarksTie

    Across 1 shared benchmarks the two models split wins evenly. Look at task-specific scores rather than the average.

  • ModalitiesTie

    Both handle text.

  • OpennessTie

    Both ship open weights, self-host either one.

On balance DeepSeek-V3 edges ahead, winning 1 of 5 categories against DeepSeek-Coder-V2's 0. DeepSeek-V3 publishes pricing ($1.10 / 1M output tokens) while DeepSeek-Coder-V2 does not. Both ship a 128K-token context window.

Across 1 shared benchmarks the two models split wins evenly. Look at task-specific scores rather than the average. Both target the same set of modalities (text), so the deciding factors are price, context, and raw quality. Both ship open weights, self-host either one.

DeepSeek-V3 is the newer of the two, released 6 months after DeepSeek-Coder-V2, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. DeepSeek-Coder-V2 is usually picked for coding llm and code completion workloads, while DeepSeek-V3 sees more deployments in open source llm and commercial use llm. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.

Side-by-side specs

SpecDeepSeek-Coder-V2DeepSeek-V3
ProviderDeepSeekDeepSeek
ReleasedJun 2024Dec 2024
Modalitiestexttext
Context window128K tokens128K tokens
Max output,,
Input · 1MPricing not published$0.27 / 1M tokens
Output · 1MPricing not published$1.10 / 1M tokens
Knowledge cutoff,2024-07
Open weightsYes (MIT)Yes (MIT)
API availableYesYes

Pricing at scale

What you'd actually pay at typical workloads. Numbers come from each model's published per-million-token rates.

  • Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day, vs $2.46
  • Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day, vs $24.60
  • RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day, vs $47.10

Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates).

Price calculator

Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.

  • DeepSeek-Coder-V2Pricing unavailable
  • DeepSeek-V3$0.082

Benchmarks compared

Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.

DeepSeek-Coder-V2DeepSeek-V3
  • MMLU,88.5
  • HumanEval90.290.0
Pick DeepSeek-Coder-V2 if

DeepSeek-Coder-V2 fits when…

  • Code-specialist
  • MIT license
  • FIM support
Pick DeepSeek-V3 if

DeepSeek-V3 fits when…

  • Frontier-level quality at open-weight prices
  • MIT license, clean commercial use
  • Cheap to serve via MoE architecture
Don't want either?

Consider DeepSeek-R1

First open-weight reasoning model to match o1, the release that proved RL-from-scratch reasoning training was reproducible.

See DeepSeek-R1 specsDeepSeek-Coder-V2 vs DeepSeek-R1DeepSeek-V3 vs DeepSeek-R1

Frequently asked

  • Is DeepSeek-Coder-V2 or DeepSeek-V3 cheaper?
    Per-token pricing isn't published for at least one of these models, check each model's spec page for current rates.
  • Which has the larger context window?
    Both DeepSeek-Coder-V2 and DeepSeek-V3 ship a 128K-token context window.
  • Is DeepSeek-Coder-V2 or DeepSeek-V3 better for coding?
    Both DeepSeek-Coder-V2 and DeepSeek-V3 are competitive on coding benchmarks. See each model's individual spec page for HumanEval and SWE-bench scores where published. For an opinionated pick, consult our Best LLM for Coding ranking.
  • Are either of these models open source?
    Both ship with open weights. DeepSeek-Coder-V2 is licensed under MIT; DeepSeek-V3 under MIT.
  • When were DeepSeek-Coder-V2 and DeepSeek-V3 released?
    DeepSeek-Coder-V2 was released by DeepSeek on 2024-06-17. DeepSeek-V3 was released by DeepSeek on 2024-12-26.
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