Claude 4.5 Sonnet vs DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp)
Live Unit Economics, Prompt Cache Pricing, TTFT Latency & Multi-Benchmark Analysis
Which model is better: Claude 4.5 Sonnet or DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp)?
Verified Performance & Unit Economics Delta (12 Dimensions)
Daily synchronized metrics across token pricing, prompt cache economics, latency, throughput, and 5 capability benchmarks.
| Metric / Dimension | Claude 4.5 Sonnet | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) | Net Delta / Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input Cost / 1M Tokens | $3.00 | $0.22 | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) is 13.6x cheaper |
| Output Cost / 1M Tokens | $15.00 | $0.65 | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (95.7% lower) |
| Prompt Cache Read / 1M | $0.300 | $0.007 | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) is 43.5x cheaper |
| Prompt Cache Write / 1M | $3.75 | $0.22 | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) is 17.0x cheaper |
| Context Window (Max Output) | 205k (64k out) | 1,049k (128k out) | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (5.1x larger context) |
| Avg TTFT Response Latency | 380ms | 310ms | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (70ms faster) |
| Generation Speed (Throughput) | 84 tok/s | 165 tok/s | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (+81 tok/s faster) |
| SWE-bench Verified (Coding) | 75.8% | 77.4% | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (+1.6% lead) |
| GPQA Diamond (PhD STEM) | 84.2% | 91.3% | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (+7.1% lead) |
| MMLU-Pro (Multi-Discipline) | 90.4% | 87.3% | Claude 4.5 Sonnet (+3.1% lead) |
| MATH-500 (Quantitative Logic) | 97.5% | 96.4% | Claude 4.5 Sonnet (+1.1% lead) |
| Inference Value Score (IVR) | 56.5 / 100 | 81.6 / 100 | DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (+25.1 pts) |
Interactive Monthly Token Economics & ROI Forecaster
Model production workloads across prompt, completion, and cached context tokens, or switch models on the fly.
Estimated Monthly Spend
$3.00/1M in · $15.00/1M out
Prompt Cache: $0.300/1M read · $3.75/1M write
$0.22/1M in · $0.65/1M out
Prompt Cache: $0.007/1M read · $0.22/1M write
When to Choose Claude 4.5 Sonnet
Choose Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Anthropic) for end-to-end autonomous coding agents, complex multi-file debugging, browser/GUI automation, and high-precision technical writing — offering a 204k context window, 380ms TTFT, and $3.00/1M input pricing ($0.300/1M cached reads).
When to Choose DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp)
Choose DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (DeepSeek) for ultra-low-cost open-weight multimodal MoE built for high-throughput visual document OCR, chart interpretation, and real-time autonomous coding agents — offering a 1,048k context window, 310ms TTFT, and $0.22/1M input pricing ($0.007/1M cached reads).
Related Questions & Decision Factors
Which is cheaper: Claude 4.5 Sonnet or DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp)?
DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) is cheaper at $0.22/1M input tokens ($0.65/1M output) compared to $3.00/1M input ($15.00/1M output) for Claude 4.5 Sonnet.
Which model has lower TTFT latency and higher tok/s throughput: Claude 4.5 Sonnet or DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp)?
DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) delivers faster first-token latency at 310ms TTFT (165 tok/s throughput) compared to 380ms TTFT (84 tok/s) for Claude 4.5 Sonnet.
How do Claude 4.5 Sonnet and DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) compare on SWE-bench coding and GPQA Diamond reasoning?
On SWE-bench Verified software engineering, Claude 4.5 Sonnet scores 75.8% versus 77.4% for DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp). On GPQA Diamond graduate-level STEM reasoning, Claude 4.5 Sonnet scores 84.2% versus 91.3% for DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (and 97.5% vs 96.4% on MATH-500).
When should you choose Claude 4.5 Sonnet?
Choose Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Anthropic) for end-to-end autonomous coding agents, complex multi-file debugging, browser/GUI automation, and high-precision technical writing — offering a 204k context window, 380ms TTFT, and $3.00/1M input pricing ($0.300/1M cached reads).
When should you choose DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp)?
Choose DeepSeek V4 Flash Vision (Exp) (DeepSeek) for ultra-low-cost open-weight multimodal MoE built for high-throughput visual document OCR, chart interpretation, and real-time autonomous coding agents — offering a 1,048k context window, 310ms TTFT, and $0.22/1M input pricing ($0.007/1M cached reads).