AI Lineup
DeepSeek
by DeepSeek (China)
Surprised the entire AI industry with its reasoning ability, though it routes through Chinese infrastructure, which is worth weighing.
FreeOpen SourceChatbot
Last checked: 29 September 2026
The details
- Current models
- DeepSeek V4 Pro (in the app and on the web since August 2026) and V4.1 Flash (September 2026), with context windows of up to 1 million tokens. R1 was the early-2025 reasoning model that first made DeepSeek famous.
- Cost
- Free in the app and on the web. The developer API is pay-as-you-go and among the cheapest available.
- Open Source?
- Yes, the models are open-weight. ⚠️ Made in China: the app and website run on DeepSeek's own servers. We can't guarantee your privacy here (no big AI company can fully guarantee it), so keep sensitive personal information out.
- Input / Output
- Text and images in (V4.1 Flash reads pictures) · Text out
Best for
- Coding & mathematics
- Detailed step-by-step reasoning
- Free frontier-quality responses
Kevin’s take
“Made a big splash by being excellent and free. Worth knowing about. I'd be cautious about putting anything truly private into it given it's operated in China.”
— Kevin, formerly of IT Support
Privacy snapshot
Research FirstPrivacy risk: High
A capable, low-cost Chinese AI assistant, strong at reasoning and coding. It made waves by matching far more expensive models.
See what DeepSeek does with your data →Knowing the tool is just the start.
We teach non-tech people how to actually use AI — what to ask, how to ask it, and what to do with the answers. Tutorials, prompts, plain English. All of it.
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