DeepSeek R1 vs GPT-5 nano
DeepSeek R1 vs GPT-5 nano: GPT-5 nano is cheaper by 96% on average. DeepSeek R1 from Azure AI Foundry (128,000-token context, reasoning) vs. GPT-5 nano from Azure OpenAI (272,000-token context, reasoning, tool calls). Use Agent Command Center to A/B both in shadow mode and pick the winner per workload.
Side-by-side cost
Live workload comparison
Same workload run through both models. The cheaper one is highlighted.
3,000
0272,000
400
0128,000
5,000
01,000,000
At this workload, GPT-5 nano is 95% cheaper than DeepSeek R1 — a savings of $898/month ($10,775/year).
Production recipe — Agent Command Center
strategy: cost-optimized
primary:
model: gpt-5-nano
provider: azure-openai
fallback:
model: deepseek-r1
provider: azure-ai-foundry
shadow: { sample_rate: 0.05 } # mirror 5% of traffic to compare quality live| DeepSeek R1 | GPT-5 nano | |
|---|---|---|
| Input price | $1.35/M | $0.0500/M |
| Output price | $5.40/M | $0.400/M |
| Context window | 128,000 | 272,000 |
| Max output | 8,192 | 128,000 |
| Function calling | — | ✓ |
| Vision | — | ✓ |
| Audio input | — | — |
| Reasoning | ✓ | ✓ |
| Prompt caching | — | ✓ |
| Structured output | — | ✓ |
| Pricing verified | May 12, 2026 | May 12, 2026 |
Benchmark comparison
Side-by-side public benchmark scores. Greener bar = winner.
MMLU-Proreasoning⚠ different settings
DeepSeek R1
84.0%
GPT-5 nano
73.0%