DeepInfra vs Moonshot AI

Moonshot sells Kimi K3, the most capable open-weight model, at near-frontier prices. DeepInfra sells a wide open catalog at the price floor.

By The Subconscious Team · Updated September 30, 2026

DeepInfra vs Moonshot AI: key differences

Moonshot is a model lab with one flagship worth paying for. Kimi K3 scored 93.4% on SWE-bench Verified in Vals AI's neutral harness, fourth overall behind closed frontier models, and it reads 1M tokens with native vision. That costs $3 in and $15 out per million, with cached input at $0.30. DeepInfra plays a different game: 150+ open models, none its own, with prices like $0.14 in and $0.28 out on DeepSeek V4 Flash and $0.02 on Llama 3.1 8B. With Moonshot you are buying capability on hard tasks. With DeepInfra you are buying volume on routine ones.

The trade-offs follow that split. K3 runs around 33 tokens per second, always thinks, and demand overran Moonshot's GPUs within days of launch, pausing new API subscriptions for a time. DeepInfra's risks sit elsewhere, in heavy default quantization that can cut quality and context, such as the 66K cap on its FP4 DeepSeek V4 Pro. Long-horizon coding on huge repositories belongs on Kimi K3. Bulk tagging, extraction and budget chat belong on DeepInfra, where a slow, verbose frontier model would burn money for no gain.

What DeepInfra and Moonshot AI do

DeepInfra

DeepInfra is the price floor for open-model inference. Developers treat it as the reference point for what a token should cost, with small models like Llama 3.1 8B at $0.02 per million and DeepSeek V4 Flash at $0.14 in and $0.28 out. The catalog covers 150+ open models across text, image and speech behind a fully OpenAI-compatible API. There are no minimums, setup fees or contracts on the shared API.

Example models: DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 3.1 8B

Full DeepInfra profile

Moonshot AI

Moonshot AI is the Beijing lab behind the Kimi models. Its flagship Kimi K3 launched July 16, 2026 as a 2.8 trillion parameter mixture-of-experts model that activates 16 of 896 experts per token, with native vision and a 1M token context. It is the first open model in the 3T class, and full weights landed on Hugging Face on July 27. The hosted API costs $3 in and $15 out per million tokens, with cached input at $0.30, and it runs through an OpenAI-compatible endpoint, Kimi Code in the terminal, OpenRouter and Cloudflare Workers AI.

Example models: Kimi K3, Kimi K2.6

Full Moonshot AI profile

Should you choose DeepInfra or Moonshot AI?

DeepInfra

Choose DeepInfra for

Routine bulk work where a frontier-class model is overkill
Consumer chat backends that need the lowest cost per reply
Broad catalog access without a single-lab dependency

Moonshot AI

Choose Moonshot AI for

Repo-scale coding agents that need near-frontier scores
Document-heavy research and visual agents that use 1M context
Teams that want the strongest open weights straight from the lab

DeepInfra vs Moonshot AI at a glance

Attribute	DeepInfra	Moonshot AI
Model access	Open weights	Open weights, custom license
Flagship models	DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 3.1 8B	Kimi K3, Kimi K2.6
Speed	~33 tok/s on DeepSeek V4 Pro (FP4)	~33 tok/s on Kimi K3
Price	From $0.02 per 1M	$3 in, $15 out (Kimi K3)
Customization	No managed fine-tuning	Open weights to fine-tune
Deployment	Shared API, no contracts	API, Kimi Code, OpenRouter
Long context	66K on FP4 DeepSeek V4 Pro	1M

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between DeepInfra and Moonshot AI?

Moonshot sells Kimi K3, the most capable open-weight model, at near-frontier prices. DeepInfra sells a wide open catalog at the price floor.

When should I choose DeepInfra over Moonshot AI?

Routine bulk work where a frontier-class model is overkill; Consumer chat backends that need the lowest cost per reply; Broad catalog access without a single-lab dependency.

When should I choose Moonshot AI over DeepInfra?

Repo-scale coding agents that need near-frontier scores; Document-heavy research and visual agents that use 1M context; Teams that want the strongest open weights straight from the lab.

Is DeepInfra or Moonshot AI cheaper?

DeepInfra: From $0.02 per 1M. Moonshot AI: $3 in, $15 out (Kimi K3). The cheaper choice depends on the model and workload.

Which has more context, DeepInfra or Moonshot AI?

DeepInfra: 66K on FP4 DeepSeek V4 Pro. Moonshot AI: 1M.

Related comparisons

Running long-horizon agents?

If your agents run past 200K tokens, compare both against Subconscious. Our inference stack treats a long-horizon trace as the primary workload, so speed, cost, and accuracy hold up deep into the trace.

Subconscious vs DeepInfra Subconscious vs Moonshot AI