DeepSeek-R1 vs Gemini 3 Pro
A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.
Updated
DeepSeek-R1 specs · Gemini 3 Pro specs- PriceDeepSeek-R1
DeepSeek-R1 publishes pricing ($2.19 / 1M output tokens) while Gemini 3 Pro does not.
- Context windowGemini 3 Pro
Gemini 3 Pro accepts 1.0M tokens vs 128K, 8.2× the room for long documents and codebases.
- BenchmarksGemini 3 Pro
Gemini 3 Pro leads in 1 of 1 shared benchmarks; the biggest gap is on GPQA (graduate-level reasoning), where it scores 91.9 vs 71.5.
- ModalitiesGemini 3 Pro
Gemini 3 Pro supports 4 modalities (text, vision, audio, video) vs 1 for DeepSeek-R1.
- OpennessDeepSeek-R1
DeepSeek-R1 ships open weights (MIT); Gemini 3 Pro is API-only.
On balance Gemini 3 Pro edges ahead, winning 3 of 5 categories against DeepSeek-R1's 2. DeepSeek-R1 publishes pricing ($2.19 / 1M output tokens) while Gemini 3 Pro does not. Gemini 3 Pro accepts 1.0M tokens vs 128K, 8.2× the room for long documents and codebases.
Gemini 3 Pro leads in 1 of 1 shared benchmarks; the biggest gap is on GPQA (graduate-level reasoning), where it scores 91.9 vs 71.5. They differ in modality coverage, DeepSeek-R1 handles text while Gemini 3 Pro handles text, vision, audio, video, which can be the deciding factor before you even look at benchmarks. DeepSeek-R1 ships open weights (MIT); Gemini 3 Pro is API-only.
Gemini 3 Pro is the newer of the two, released 11 months after DeepSeek-R1, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. DeepSeek-R1 is usually picked for reasoning and math workloads, while Gemini 3 Pro sees more deployments in long context and rag. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.
Side-by-side specs
| Spec | DeepSeek-R1 | Gemini 3 Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | DeepSeek | |
| Released | Jan 2025 | Dec 2025 |
| Modalities | text | text, vision, audio, video |
| Context window | 128K tokens | 1.0M tokens |
| Max output | , | 65.5K tokens |
| Input · 1M | $0.55 / 1M tokens | Pricing not published |
| Output · 1M | $2.19 / 1M tokens | Pricing not published |
| Knowledge cutoff | 2024-07 | 2025-01 |
| Open weights | Yes (MIT) | No |
| API available | Yes | Yes |
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$4.94 vs ,
- Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day$49.35 vs ,
- RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day$95.64 vs ,
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).
Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- DeepSeek-R1$0.165
- Gemini 3 ProPricing unavailable
Benchmarks compared
Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.
- MMLU,91.8
- HumanEval,95.4
- GPQA71.591.9
DeepSeek-R1 fits when…
- Open-weight reasoning model on par with o1
- MIT license
- Cheap reasoning per token
- Self-hosting and on-prem requirements, open weights (MIT).
Gemini 3 Pro fits when…
- Massive 1M-token context window
- State-of-the-art vision and document understanding
- Strong reasoning at competitive price
- Long-context tasks, handles 1.0M tokens vs 128K for DeepSeek-R1.
- Multimodal needs covering vision, audio, video.
Consider DeepSeek-V3
DeepSeek's flagship 671B-parameter MoE, frontier-level quality at a tiny fraction of frontier prices.
Frequently asked
Is DeepSeek-R1 or Gemini 3 Pro 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?
Gemini 3 Pro accepts 1.0M tokens vs 128K for DeepSeek-R1.Is DeepSeek-R1 or Gemini 3 Pro better for coding?
Both DeepSeek-R1 and Gemini 3 Pro 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?
DeepSeek-R1 ships open weights (MIT). Gemini 3 Pro is API-only.When were DeepSeek-R1 and Gemini 3 Pro released?
DeepSeek-R1 was released by DeepSeek on 2025-01-20. Gemini 3 Pro was released by Google on 2025-12-09.
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