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Groq vs DeepSeek
DeepSeek offers 1M context and rock-bottom off-peak prices on its own models from China. Groq offers speed on a small open catalog capped near 131K.
By The Subconscious Team · Updated
Groq vs DeepSeek: key differences
DeepSeek sells its own two models, V4.1 Flash and V4 Pro, each with 1M context and 384K max output. At peak, Flash costs $0.30 in and $1.20 out, and every off-peak hour costs exactly half, which lands on US business hours. Cache hits cost a few cents per million or less. Groq does not list DeepSeek; it serves GPT-OSS and Qwen 3.6 on its LPU, at hundreds of tokens per second, with context capped around 131K. So the trade is context and price against raw speed and latency consistency.
Data location matters as much as speed. DeepSeek's hosted API stores data in China, a hard stop for many enterprises, and it retires and reprices models often. Groq's API is OpenAI-compatible and hosts Whisper and the Groq Compound agent system, though its own future is uncertain after NVIDIA hired most of its staff. Long-context agents that reread large prefixes get more out of DeepSeek's cheap cache. Voice and fast multi-step loops on short prompts get more out of Groq.
What Groq and DeepSeek do
Groq
Groq serves open models on its own chip, the LPU, which keeps model weights in on-chip SRAM and runs a deterministic schedule instead of waiting on GPU memory. Groq publishes 1,000 tokens per second on GPT-OSS 20B and 500 on GPT-OSS 120B. Latency stays tight between median and tail, which matters for strict SLAs. The API is OpenAI-compatible and also hosts Whisper for speech to text plus an agentic system called Groq Compound with built-in search and code execution.
Example models: GPT-OSS 120B, Qwen 3.6 27B
Full Groq profileDeepSeek
DeepSeek is the Chinese lab whose open-weight models reset price expectations for the whole market. Its API now serves two models, both with 1M context and 384K max output. V4.1 Flash shipped September 10, 2026 with built-in image understanding at $0.30 in and $1.20 out at peak. V4 Pro, generally available since August 13, costs $1.32 in and $3.96 out at peak. Cache hits cost a few cents per million or less, and the weights ship on Hugging Face under an MIT license.
Example models: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash, DeepSeek V4 Pro
Full DeepSeek profileShould you choose Groq or DeepSeek?
Groq vs DeepSeek at a glance
| Attribute | Groq | DeepSeek |
|---|---|---|
| Model access | Open weights | Open weights (MIT) |
| Flagship models | GPT-OSS 120B, Qwen 3.6 27B | DeepSeek V4.1 Flash, V4 Pro |
| Speed | 500–1,000 tok/s | ~35 tok/s on V4 Pro |
| Price | Near the floor on small models | Off-peak hours at half price |
| Customization | No fine-tuned model hosting | Open weights to fine-tune |
| Deployment | GroqCloud API | First-party API, Hugging Face weights |
| Long context | Around 131K max | 1M, 384K max output |
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between Groq and DeepSeek?
DeepSeek offers 1M context and rock-bottom off-peak prices on its own models from China. Groq offers speed on a small open catalog capped near 131K.
When should I choose Groq over DeepSeek?
Fast voice replies on short prompts; Teams that cannot send data to China; Agent loops where each step must return quickly.
When should I choose DeepSeek over Groq?
1M context agents with cheap cache hits; Batch jobs run during half-price off-peak hours; Fine-tuning MIT-licensed weights.
Is Groq or DeepSeek cheaper?
Groq: Near the floor on small models. DeepSeek: Off-peak hours at half price. The cheaper choice depends on the model and workload.
Which has more context, Groq or DeepSeek?
Groq: Around 131K max. DeepSeek: 1M, 384K max output.
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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.