Side-by-side comparison · AI Assistants & LLMs
Claude vs DeepSeek vs Qwen Chat
Everything that matters when choosing between them, in one place: our rating, what each can do, what they cost, and the trade-offs.
Comparing 3 tools, the maximum.
At a glance
Pick it if: Anyone who writes, researches or makes decisions for a living, plus anyone curious about Claude Code.
Pick it if: Anyone who wants a strong reasoning assistant for free, and developers watching their API costs.
Pick it if: Anyone after a capable free assistant with image, video, slides and website tools, and developers who want open models.
Claude scores highest overall, but DeepSeek gives you more for your money. Which one is right comes down to what you value most.
Overview
| Attribute | Claude | DeepSeek | Qwen Chat |
|---|---|---|---|
| In one line | Anthropic's chat assistant, at its best on careful writing and long documents. | A free Chinese assistant that's strong at maths, logic and code. | Alibaba's generous free assistant for research, slides, websites, images and video. |
| Pricing model | Freemium | Free | Freemium |
| Starting price | $20/mo | Pay per use | $4/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Works with Claude Code | Yes | No | No |
Rating breakdown
Our scores out of 5. The higher bar in each row is highlighted.
| Attribute | Claude | DeepSeek | Qwen Chat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Overall rating | 4.6Winner | 3.8 | 4.0 |
| Ease of useHow quickly someone non-technical gets value from it. | 4.5 | 3.5 | 4.0 |
| FeaturesHow completely it covers its own job, and how well the pieces fit together. | 4.5 | 3.0 | 4.0 |
| Output qualityHow good the results are before you fix them. | 5.0 | 4.0 | 4.0 |
| Value for moneyWhat you get for the price, including the free plan. | 4.5 | 5.0 | 4.5 |
| Speed & reliabilityHow fast it is and how often it falls over. | 4.5 | 3.5 | 3.5 |
Feature comparison
A tick means it does this today. A dash means we haven't checked.
| Attribute | Claude | DeepSeek | Qwen Chat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Access & platform | |||
| Free plan | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mobile app | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Desktop app | Yes | No | No |
| Browser extension | Yes | No | No |
| API access | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Teams & business | |||
| Team workspace | Yes | No | No |
| Enterprise plan or SSO | Yes | No | No |
| Connects to other apps | Yes | No | No |
| Open source or self-hosted | No | Yes | Yes |
| AI abilities | |||
| Works with your files | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Understands images | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Makes images | No | No | Yes |
| Makes video | No | No | Yes |
| Writes code | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Runs agents or automations | Yes | No | Yes |
| Learns your brand or style | Yes | No | No |
| Works in many languages | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Capabilities score | 14/ 17 | 8/ 17 | 11/ 17 |
Pricing
Plans as listed on each vendor's site when we last checked. Confirm before you buy.
| Attribute | Claude | DeepSeek | Qwen Chat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Plans | Free Free Trying it out and light daily use. | Chat appOur pick Free Anyone who wants a capable reasoning assistant at no cost. | FreeOur pick Free Most people. The free limits are generous for chat and research. |
ProOur pick $20/mo, or $17/mo billed yearly Anyone who uses it most days. | API (deepseek-flash) Pay per use, from $0.15 per million input tokens Developers building cheap features into their own apps. | Go $4/mo Regular users who want higher chat limits. | |
Max From $100/mo Heavy users and people living in Claude Code. | API (deepseek-v4-pro) Pay per use, from $0.66 per million input tokens Developers who want the stronger model. | Plus $19/mo Creators making images and video most days. | |
Team From $20/seat/mo billed yearly Businesses with 2 to 150 people. | Pro $99/mo Heavy video and image users who need priority. | ||
| Which plan to pick | Start on Free to see if the writing suits you. Most people who stick with it move to Pro within a month; only go to Max if you hit the Pro limits every day or you're running Claude Code for hours at a time. | The app is free, so the only decision is whether the privacy trade-off is acceptable for what you're asking. If you need the model inside your own software, have a developer use the API or run the open model through a provider that keeps your data in Australia. | Start free; most people never need to pay. Go at $4 is cheap if you hit the chat limits. Prices are App Store prices, so check the in-app screen before you subscribe. |
Key features
Pros and cons
| Attribute | Claude | DeepSeek | Qwen Chat |
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Who each one is for
| Attribute | Claude | DeepSeek | Qwen Chat |
|---|---|---|---|
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Questions people ask
Which is better, Claude, DeepSeek or Qwen Chat?
Claude scores highest overall in our ratings (Claude 4.6/5, DeepSeek 3.8/5 and Qwen Chat 4.0/5). Claude is best for long-form writing and editing and reading and summarising long documents. DeepSeek is best for Maths, logic and step-by-step problems and coding help. Qwen Chat is best for A free assistant that does a bit of everything and quick webpages and slide decks from a prompt.
Which is cheaper, Claude, DeepSeek or Qwen Chat?
Claude: There's a free plan, and paid plans start at $20/mo. DeepSeek: There's a free plan, and paid plans start at Pay per use. Qwen Chat: There's a free plan, and paid plans start at $4/mo.
Which is easier to use, Claude, DeepSeek or Qwen Chat?
Claude rates highest for ease of use in our scores. Anyone who writes, researches or makes decisions for a living, plus anyone curious about Claude Code.
How we compare
Ratings are our own, from using each tool, across ease of use, features, output quality, value for money, speed & reliability.
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