DeepSeek V3.5
DeepSeek · released 2025-12-01
Quality (AA Index)81
Input price$0.14
Output price$0.28
Context128K
Throughput95 tok/s
P50 latency1.5s
DeepSeek V3.5 vs Kimi K3
Side-by-side pricing, capabilities, real-world cost across common scenarios, and our editorial pick.
Add a modelUp to 4 models can be compared
all prices in USD per 1M tokens
Kimi K3
Moonshot · released 2026-03-15
Quality (AA Index)80
Input price$0.30
Output price$1.20
Context200K
Throughput150 tok/s
P50 latency0.8s
Links open in a new tab via our OpenRouter referral. Affiliate disclosure
Head-to-head specs
Green column = winner per metric| Metric | DeepSeek V3.5 | Kimi K3 | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
Input price /1M tokens | $0.14 | $0.30 | DeepSeek V3.5 −53% |
Output price /1M tokens | $0.28 | $1.20 | DeepSeek V3.5 −77% |
Context window max input length | 128K | 200K | Kimi K3 +1.6× |
AA Quality AA Intelligence Index (0–100) | 81 | 80 | DeepSeek V3.5 +1pt |
Arena Elo LMArena human-pref Elo (800–2000) | — | — | Tied |
Throughput tokens per second | 95 | 150 | Kimi K3 +58% |
P50 latency first token | 1.5s | 0.8s | Kimi K3 −47% |
Vision multimodal | — | — | Tied |
Function calling tool use | Tied | ||
Reasoning mode chain-of-thought | — | — | Tied |
Monthly cost across common scenarios
Default usage assumptions| Scenario | DeepSeek V3.5 | Kimi K3 |
|---|---|---|
customer support 1000K req · 600/180 tok | $134 | $396 |
chat with docs 300K req · 4000/300 tok | $193 | $468 |
code generation 500K req · 2000/500 tok | $210 | $600 |
voice assistant 600K req · 800/200 tok | $101 | $288 |
Our pick
For most workloads, choose DeepSeek V3.5.
- 53% cheaper input price, which compounds at scale
Roughly GPT-4o-class quality at roughly 90% off. Tradeoff is region availability (Chinese provider) and slower output throughput than Western frontier tiers.
Choose Kimi K3 instead if: Tradeoffs for this pair have not yet been documented. The quality difference may be small enough that workload fit, integration cost, and team familiarity decide the choice.
Read our deep analysis
Why pick? Use both with smart routing
Phase 2 · gateway with fallback chainSet DeepSeek V3.5 as primary, Kimi K3 as fallback. One key, one bill, automatic failover when DeepSeek V3.5 errors.
PHASE 2 PREVIEW · gateway not live yetThis endpoint does not exist yet. The gateway is in Phase 2 — what you see below is a design preview of the planned interface, not a live API. We will email subscribers when it launches.
Preview the planned API call
$ curl https://api.aipricly.com/v1/chat/completions \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $AIPC_KEY" \
-d '{
"routing": {
"primary": "deepseek/deepseek-v3-5",
"fallback": ["moonshot/kimi-k3"]
},
"messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "..."}]
}'