Directly here: https://platform.deepseek.com/ Easy top-up and pay as you go. Availability and speed are very good and it is the cheaper option.

I've been using DeepSeek directly. I've heard from colleagues that using it via OpenRouter is slower, but I'm not so sure about that.

> does it make a difference

Probably not.

But Opencode-Go is a great solution for those who don't want to pay DeepSeek directly (or can't due to reasons)

Selfish referral code: https://opencode.ai/go?ref=R1AJZT4VBX

For hosted APIs, it's a lot cheaper to use their own infra, caching seems a hell of a lot better there compared to OpenRouter, and indeed the tok/s seems higher. They also have peak/off-peak pricing, so if you can hold off with your request, you get a pretty big discount.

Otherwise, if you're trying to run it locally, even really low quantizations like DeepSeek-V4-Flash-IQ2XXS-w2Q2K-AProjQ8-SExpQ8-OutQ8-chat-v2-imatrix seem to actually not be so dumb compared to smaller models with same quantization, might be worth a try if you're sitting on a lot of RAM/VRAM yet not industry-scale amount :)

I use it directly: https://platform.deepseek.com/usage

3rd party providers on OpenRouter can be cheaper but it's already so cheap.

Opencode-go gives you $60 worth of DS V4 api usage for $10 per month. Right now I think it's hard to exhaust that when using flash exclusively, and plain API use might even be cheaper! Anyway, for DS usage it's a good deal.

To add to this, the $60 only applies to DeepSeek-V4-Flash and a few other models. For DeepSeek-V4-Pro, the amount is $15.

https://opencode.ai/docs/go/#usage-limits

Previously, OpenCode Go had higher API prices for some models, but now they lowered the API price and simultaneously reduced the allowance.

Thanks. These things change day by day I guess, AI is just moving fast (and I'm on vacation).

GPT 5.6 Luna is a new model in Go since I last checked, for example.

Opencode also have a ZDR (zero data retention) deal with them – if I recall correctly, that's not something you can enable as an individual DeepSeek subscriber.

I really like OpenCode - BUT: there is a loophole the size of Portugal in that ZDR language. All they say is that their providers follow a ZDR policy. I haven’t found anything promising that OpenCode themselves don’t retain Go usage data. Something to be mindful of.

Unfortunately, all mentions of ZDR have silently been removed from the OpenCode Go page today.

Thanks, any update here is important. I use them because of good data policies..

I still find this today:

> The plan is designed primarily for international users and provides stable global access. Your data will not be used for model training.

dax (coauthor) recently tweeted https://xcancel.com/thdxr/status/2083178051052155182

> because we added the new deepseek which we do not yet have a ZDR with we cannot blanket say we offer ZDR

I wonder how the website can make the statement that data will not be used for training.

Do they do other things with the data, like selling it?

I used it through openrouter. Plugged in to the vs code copilot bring your own key thing.

Played around for a few hours and used up 80 cents of tokens.

Anecdotal data from my own tests: allow only one provider if you want good cache usage on OR. 80 cents is probably 4x the price you should have paid.

Providers' cache hit stats are available to consult, and only 1-2 of them behave properly if I remember correctly, zero if you request providers that don't store and train on sessions.

OpenCode harness gets the most out of DS V4 Flash model. You can implement any coding task, fast and cheap.

Openrouter