Model comparison

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus vs o3-mini

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus is the stronger model overall, scoring 42.6 to 36.7 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 14 shared benchmarks.

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus DeepSeek

42.6

Rank #96 Confirmed

o3-mini OpenAI

36.7

Rank #205 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 14 benchmarks with published results for both. DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus scores higher in 6 categories and o3-mini in 1 category; 5 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in writing & preference, where DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus leads 61.3 to 50.4.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is DTBench: 81.3% for DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus and 68.8% for o3-mini.
  • DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus is cheaper at $0.30 / $1 per million input/output tokens, against $1.10 / $4.40 for o3-mini.
  • o3-mini accepts more context: 200K tokens versus 164K.
  • DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus and o3-mini specifications
DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
ProviderDeepSeekOpenAI
Noometry Index42.636.7
Released2025-09-222024-12-20
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window164K200K
Max output66K100K
Input $ / M tokens$0.30$1.10
Output $ / M tokens$1$4.40
Results tracked1651

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Category by category

Coding Too close to call

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 41.5 (#114), o3-mini: 41.4 (#116)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
SciCode40.6%39.8%
LMArena Coding14261378
Aider Polyglot—60.4%
GSO—1.3%
WeirdML—43.7%
LiveBench Coding—82.7%
CadEval—54%
ALE-Bench745.17—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: —, o3-mini: 29.3 (#79)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
Cybench—22.5%

Reasoning DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus leads

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 25.7 (#126), o3-mini: 16.3 (#295)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
CritPt1.7%0.3%
LMArena Hard Prompts14271366
DTBench81.3%68.8%
LMCA28.6%19%
ARC-AGI-2—3%
SimpleBench—22.8%
Kagi LLM Benchmark57.4%—
ARC-AGI-1—34.5%
Chess Puzzles—17%
LiveBench Reasoning—89.6%
Mystery Game Puzzles—7%
LiveBench Data Analysis—70.6%
Epoch Capabilities Index—140.35
ForecastBench—59.6
LiveBench—75.9%

Math DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus leads

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 35.7 (#138), o3-mini: 27.6 (#236)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
LMArena Math14021396
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)—18.6%
FrontierMath Tier 4—0%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025—76.9%
LiveBench Math—77.3%
MATH Level 5—96.5%
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)—12.4%
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)—4.2%

Knowledge Not comparable

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: —, o3-mini: 38.3 (#135)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
GPQA Diamond—77%
SimpleQA Verified—15.3%
Confabulations—17.9%
LMArena Expert—1364

Multilingual DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus leads

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 52.3 (#87), o3-mini: 45.9 (#159)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
LMArena Non-English14071319
LMArena Russian14341304
LMArena Chinese—1379
LMArena French—1333
LMArena German—1303
LMArena Japanese—1286
LMArena Korean—1314
LMArena Spanish—1321

Instruction Following Too close to call

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 74.4 (#96), o3-mini: 75.3 (#67)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
LMArena Instruction Following14061338
LiveBench Instruction Following—84.4%

Long Context DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus leads

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 43.5 (#88), o3-mini: 33.8 (#251)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
LMArena Longer Query14261343
Fiction.LiveBench—50%

Writing & Preference DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus leads

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus: 61.3 (#87), o3-mini: 50.4 (#177)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkDeepSeek-V3.1-Terminuso3-mini
LMArena Text14201337
LMArena Creative Writing14041286
LMArena Multi-Turn14111320
Short-Story Creative Writing—61.7%
LiveBench Language—50.7%

Frequently asked questions

Is DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus better than o3-mini?

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus is the stronger model overall, scoring 42.6 to 36.7 on the Noometry Index.

Which is cheaper, DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus or o3-mini?

DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus is cheaper. It lists at $0.30 per million input tokens and $1 per million output tokens; o3-mini lists at $1.10 and $4.40.

Is DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus or o3-mini better for coding?

They score almost the same on coding (41.5 vs 41.4); test both on your own repository before choosing.

Which has the bigger context window?

o3-mini does, with 200K tokens against 164K.

How many benchmarks do DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus and o3-mini share?

14 benchmarks have published results for both models. DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus has 16 scored results on Noometry and o3-mini has 51.

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