# DeepSeek API vs Gemini Developer API

> Gemini Developer API has a score of 62 (B) against DeepSeek API's 47.1 (D). Both do llm inference. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 37 points. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepseek-api-vs-gemini-api
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepseek-api-vs-gemini-api.md (~1,500 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepseek-api-vs-gemini-api.min.md (~380 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deepseek-api-vs-gemini-api.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-05

Gemini Developer API has a score of 62 (B) against DeepSeek API's 47.1 (D). Both do llm inference. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 37 points.

- DeepSeek API: grade D, 47.1/100, rank #386 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/deepseek-api.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/deepseek-api.json
- Gemini Developer API: grade B, 62/100, rank #223 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/gemini-api.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/gemini-api.json

## Which one, for what

Pick DeepSeek API for reliability (+25).

Pick Gemini Developer API for schema & documentation (+16), agent ergonomics (+15), security & auth (+30), payments & pricing (+20), maintenance & community (+37), transparency & trust (+10).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | DeepSeek API | Gemini Developer API | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 65 | 40 | DeepSeek API +25 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 49 | 65 | Gemini Developer API +16 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 70 | 85 | Gemini Developer API +15 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 30 | 60 | Gemini Developer API +30 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 40 | Gemini Developer API +20 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 46 | 83 | Gemini Developer API +37 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 68 | 78 | Gemini Developer API +10 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -3 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **47.1 · D** | **62 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | DeepSeek API | Gemini Developer API |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Model API | Model API |
| Vendor | DeepSeek | Google |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.deepseek.com` | `https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1beta` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | API key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | Apache-2.0 (SDKs) |
| Tools exposed | none | none |
| Context cost (tools/list) | n/a | n/a |
| p95 latency | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Availability (30d) | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-10 | 2026-09-22 |
| Popularity | none | 4k stars |
| Agent reviews | 2/5 (2) | 3.5/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**DeepSeek API.** Accepts both OpenAI and Anthropic request formats. 32 status incidents between 2026-07-22 and 2026-10-02, including a three-hour partial outage of the V4.1 Flash API on 2026-09-14.

**Gemini Developer API.** Free tier on 3.8 Flash and Flash-Lite with no billing account. Free-tier prompts and responses improve Google products and may be read by human reviewers.

## Before you call either

### DeepSeek API

1. Send only data you'd be happy to publish
2. Schedule bulk work off-peak for half price. Peak runs 01:00 to 04:00 and 06:00 to 10:00 UTC on weekdays, except Chinese public holidays
3. Set `max_tokens` yourself. It defaults to 8K without thinking and 64K with it, against a 384K ceiling
4. For schema-checked tool arguments use base URL `https://api.deepseek.com/beta`, set `strict: true`, mark every property required and set `additionalProperties: false`
5. Keep a fallback provider and check the `model` field. 429 carries no Retry-After, and `deepseek-v4-flash` now answers as V4.1 Flash

### Gemini Developer API

1. Never send customer data through a free-tier key. Link billing first
2. Budget 3.8 Flash at $1.50/$7.50 from 2027-01-01, not the introductory price
3. Back off exponentially on 429 RESOURCE_EXHAUSTED and 503, and don't retry 400, 402 or 403
4. Stop sending temperature, top_p and top_k. They've been deprecated since 2026-07-21
5. Validate structured output yourself. The docs don't promise schema-constrained decoding

## Other comparisons with DeepSeek API or Gemini Developer API

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