C
CGeneral-purpose AI chat assistant for writing, research, coding and everyday tasks
Free, from $8/mo
DeepSeek vs LM Studio
Pricing, features, platforms and who each one suits — side by side.
D
Choose DeepSeek if…
- you work on Web, iOS, Android
- you're in its core audience: developers, ai app builders
L
Choose LM Studio if…
- you want a free plan to start with
- you're in its core audience: developers, privacy-conscious professionals
Side by side
Feature DeepSeek LM Studio
Pricing modelPaidFreemium
Starting price—$20/mo
Free plan
Free trial
API
Open source
Trains AI on your content—No
Data retention—Prompts and responses not retained; cloud requests processed transiently (Zero Data Retention)
Security and compliance—GDPR
Updates, last 90 days—7
GitHub stars263.8K—
PlatformsWeb, iOS, Android, API—
CategoryAI ChatbotsLocal & Open Models
CompanyDeepSeekElement Labs, Inc.
Based in—United States
Founded——
Part of——
Key features
D DeepSeek
- Web chat at chat.deepseek.com
- Mobile app and DeepSeek Harness desktop client
- OpenAI- and Anthropic-compatible API
- 1M-token context window, 384K max output
- Thinking mode with adjustable reasoning effort
- Web search and page fetch through the API
- Discounted pricing for cache hits and off-peak hours
L LM Studio
- Bionic agent creates and edits documents, slides and PDFs
- Coding, automation and computer control tasks
- In-app download of local LLMs
- Runtime powered by MLX and llama.cpp
- Real-time on-device voice transcription in multiple languages
- Optional US-hosted open frontier models with zero data retention
- LM Link connects up to 5 devices on Free
- JavaScript and Python SDKs plus the lms CLI
Plans and prices
From each vendor's site. Prices change — confirm before buying.
DeepSeek
deepseek-flash API$0.15/1M input tokens (cache miss, off-peak), $0.6/1M output tokens off-peak; peak rates are double
deepseek-v4-pro API$0.66/1M input tokens (cache miss, off-peak), $1.98/1M output tokens off-peak; peak rates are double
Search & Fetch$0.75 per 1,000 successful requests
LM Studio
Free$0
Bionic+$20 USD/month
Pro$100 USD/month
Strengths and limitations
DeepSeek
- Off-peak API prices are 50% of peak prices
- 1M-token context on both API models
- Works with OpenAI and Anthropic API formats
- Available on web, mobile, and desktop
- Peak-hour API rates are twice the off-peak rates
- Web search and fetch through the API cost extra per request
- The site does not state free-tier terms or limits for the chat apps
LM Studio
- Free plan includes the agent, local models and offline transcription
- Voice data is processed locally
- Cloud services are stated to use Zero Data Retention
- SDKs for JavaScript and Python plus a CLI
- Hosted frontier models require a paid plan starting at $20/month
- Free plan has only limited web search
- Team subscription plans are not yet available
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Built from each vendor's public website; we haven't tested them hands-on. Editorial policy