Is DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 better than Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?

On accuracy they are statistically tied: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 scored 73.8% and Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite 75.0% on the same 80 questions from open datasets. Similar accuracy; DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 costs less per question.

Which is cheaper, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 is cheaper: $0.00091 per question as billed, against $0.0034. List prices: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 $0.15 in / $0.6 out, Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite $0.3 in / $2.5 out per million tokens.

Which is faster, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite is faster at 409 output tokens per second, against 57. Time to first token: 0.9 s for DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017, 1.1 s for Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite.

Which has the larger context window, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?

Both accept about the same amount of context: 1M and 1M tokens.

Head to head · tested 27 Oct 2026

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 vs Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: accuracy, speed and price

Similar accuracy; DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 costs less per question.

DeepSeekDeepSeek V4.1 Flash 101773.8% score · #18$0.00091 per question57 tok/s

GoogleGemini 3.5 Flash Lite75.0% score · #15$0.0034 per question409 tok/s

Verdict

Built from the measurements below

Accuracy is too close to call: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 scored 73.8% and Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite 75.0% on the same 80 questions, a gap within what chance alone could produce.
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 is 3.7× cheaper per question as billed ($0.00091 vs $0.0034), reasoning tokens included.
Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite generates text 7.1× faster: 409 tokens per second against 57.
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 starts answering sooner: 0.9 s to the first token, against 1.1 s for Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite.

Which should you choose?

Choose DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 for the lower cost per correct answer ($0.0012 against $0.0045), a quicker first token, open weights you can run yourself and more hosts to choose from on OpenRouter (30 against 2). Choose Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite for faster streaming. The widest subject gap is in medicine: Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite answered 7 of 11 correctly, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 4 of 11. With so few questions per subject, treat this as a lead to test on your own prompts, not a result.

Accuracy gap -1.2 points (z = -0.18). A winner is called only when z is at least 1.96, the usual 95% threshold. Speed, latency and price need a 10% margin.

Head to head

Same questions, same prompt, same API

Measure	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Edge
Verification scoreHigher is better	73.8%	75.0%	Too close to call
Cost per questionLower is better	$0.00091	$0.0034	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017
Output speedHigher is better	57	409	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
Time to first tokenLower is better	0.9 s	1.1 s	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017
End-to-end response timeLower is better	7.3 s	2.8 s	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
Tokens per questionLower is better	1,318	1,311	Similar
Context windowHigher is better	1M	1M	Similar

Side by side

Bars are scaled to the larger of the two values. The winner on each measure is marked in bold.

Every measure

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 first, Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite second

Verification scorehigher is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 101773.8%

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite75.0%

Cost per questionlower is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017$0.00091

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite$0.0034

Output speedhigher is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 101757

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite409

Time to first tokenlower is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 10170.9 s

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite1.1 s

End-to-end response timelower is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 10177.3 s

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite2.8 s

Tokens per questionlower is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 10171,318

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite1,311

Context windowhigher is better

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 10171M

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite1M

Score vs. cost per question

Both models in color, every other model in grey

Results by subject and dataset

Questions answered correctly. Small samples: a gap of one or two questions is noise.

Subject	Questions	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
Science	30	26/30	23/30
Engineering	15	9/15	10/15
Medicine	11	4/11	7/11
Economics	9	7/9	7/9
Law	6	4/6	4/6
Humanities & social science	9	9/9	9/9
SuperGPQA dataset	50	31/50	33/50
MMLU-Pro dataset	30	28/30	27/30

Specifications and pricing

From OpenRouter's catalogue, plus the leaderboard's test dates

Specification	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
Creator	DeepSeek	Google
Released	17 Oct 2026	21 Jul 2026
Weights	Open weights	—
Reasoning	Yes	Yes
Input	text, image	text, image, video, file, audio
Output	text	text
Context window	1M tokens	1M tokens
Knowledge cutoff	—	—
List price in / out per 1M	$0.15 / $0.6	$0.3 / $2.5
Blended price per 1M (3:1)	$0.26	$0.85
Cheapest host	Sail Research · $0.101 / $0.15	Google · $0.15 / $1.25
Hosts on OpenRouter	30	2
Last tested	25 Oct 2026	26 Oct 2026

Compare any two models →

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 vs Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: frequently asked questions

Is DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 better than Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?: On accuracy they are statistically tied: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 scored 73.8% and Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite 75.0% on the same 80 questions from open datasets. Similar accuracy; DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 costs less per question.
Which is cheaper, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 is cheaper: $0.00091 per question as billed, against $0.0034. List prices: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 $0.15 in / $0.6 out, Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite $0.3 in / $2.5 out per million tokens.
Which is faster, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?: Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite is faster at 409 output tokens per second, against 57. Time to first token: 0.9 s for DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017, 1.1 s for Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite.
Which has the larger context window, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?: Both accept about the same amount of context: 1M and 1M tokens.