ChatGPT vs DeepSeek

Two fact sheets from our own research, side by side — pricing, platforms, API access and status re-checked by us rather than quoted from the vendors.

The short answer

Free plan: Both have one
Public API: Both have one
Higher Trust score: DeepSeek — 92 vs 86 for ChatGPT
Best fit: ChatGPT: General knowledge work, drafting, analysis and code across one interface · DeepSeek: Developers and agent builders who want frontier-class output at a fraction of OpenAI or Anthropic token prices
Platforms: ChatGPT: Web, iOS, Android, macOS, Windows · DeepSeek: Web, iOS, Android

From our own records as of each tool's last check. Anything we have not confirmed is left out rather than guessed. How we verify

ChatGPTGeneral assistant with tools, memory, files and voice

DeepSeekOpen-weight reasoning models with a free chat app

Side by side

Fact	ChatGPT	DeepSeek
Category	General-purpose AI Chatbots	General-purpose AI Chatbots
Pricing model	Freemium	Freemium
Starts at	$8/mo	—
Public API	Yes	Yes
Trust score	86 / 100	92 / 100
Platforms	Web, iOS, Android, macOS, Windows, API	Web, iOS, Android, API
Company	OpenAI	Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Basic Technology Research Co., Ltd.
Launched	2022	2023
Last verified	Sep 6, 2026	Sep 6, 2026

What our research says

ChatGPT

ChatGPT is the default general assistant and the one everyone else is measured against, but the tier you need is rarely the one you first buy. Free is now ad-supported, and the jump to genuinely unlimited reasoning is steep.

Pros

Broadest tool surface of any consumer assistant: browsing, code, images, voice, connectors
The $8 Go tier closed the gap between free and a $20 commitment
Apps on every desktop and mobile platform, not just a web wrapper
Model quality is consistently at or near the front of the field

Cons

Advertising now appears on the free and Go tiers
Message and reasoning limits are opaque and change without notice
Tier structure has churned repeatedly, so any price you quote ages fast
The API is a separate purchase, which surprises buyers who assume Plus includes it

DeepSeek

Pick DeepSeek for the price-performance of the API and the open weights, not for the chat app, which is a plain assistant without the connectors and workspace features the big consumer products now carry. For a developer paying per token it is hard to beat; for a company with data-residency rules the China-hosted service and PRC-law terms settle the question before quality does.

Pros

Flash output at $1.20 per million tokens peak and $0.60 off-peak undercuts every Western frontier API by a wide margin
Open-weight releases mean the models can be run locally or on any cloud, with no lock-in to the hosted service
1M-token context on both current models, with cached-input pricing that makes long agent loops cheap
Chat app is free on web, iOS and Android with no tier to upgrade to

Cons

Terms are governed by the law of mainland China and the operator is a Hangzhou company, which rules it out for many regulated buyers
Peak and off-peak pricing by UTC window makes budgeting and benchmarking fiddly
Concurrency caps (2,500 for Flash, 500 for V4-Pro) and periodic capacity squeezes hit production workloads
The chat product trails ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude on connectors, projects and team features

Which one fits

Choose ChatGPT if you need

General knowledge work, drafting, analysis and code across one interface
Anyone who wants file, image, voice and browsing input without assembling tools
Teams that need admin controls and data-retention terms via Business or Enterprise
Light users who want more headroom than free without paying $20

Choose DeepSeek if you need

Developers and agent builders who want frontier-class output at a fraction of OpenAI or Anthropic token prices
Teams that want open weights they can host themselves and swap in behind the same API shape
Individuals who want a free reasoning assistant with a 1M-token context and no subscription