Can a free, open-weight model really compete with GPT-4? DeepSeek R1 challenges OpenAI's flagship on reasoning benchmarks — and you can run it locally.
Reasoning & Math
🤝 TieDeepSeek R1 matches GPT-4 on many math benchmarks (AIME, GSM8K). On some tests it even pulls ahead. This is remarkable for an open model.
General Knowledge
🏆 GPT-4GPT-4 has broader world knowledge and more consistent factual accuracy across diverse topics.
Cost
🏆 GPT-4DeepSeek R1 is completely free to run locally. GPT-4 costs $30-60/month or $0.03-0.06 per 1K tokens via API.
Privacy
🏆 GPT-4Running locally means your data never leaves your machine. GPT-4 requires sending data to OpenAI's servers.
Speed
🏆 GPT-4GPT-4 on OpenAI's infrastructure is faster than running a 70B model locally on consumer hardware.
Customization
🏆 GPT-4Open weights mean you can fine-tune, quantize, and modify DeepSeek R1 however you want.
🎯 Which Should You Choose?
DeepSeek R1 is a game-changer: it delivers GPT-4-class reasoning for free, running on your own hardware. GPT-4 still wins on general knowledge and speed. But for math, coding, and privacy-sensitive work, DeepSeek R1 running locally is an incredible value proposition. The 14B and 32B distilled versions make this accessible even without top-tier hardware.