Model comparison
Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale
Claude Sonnet 4.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 50.1 to 39.1 on the Noometry Index. DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale costs 7.0× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 4.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 2 shared benchmarks.
DeepSeekSummary
- They share 2 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 4.6 scores higher in 3 categories and DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale in 0 categories; 3 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Claude Sonnet 4.6 leads 70.4 to 46.1.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is WeirdML: 66.1% for Claude Sonnet 4.6 and 46.7% for DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale.
- DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale is cheaper at $0.58 / $1.68 per million input/output tokens, against $3 / $15 for Claude Sonnet 4.6.
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 128K.
- DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | DeepSeek |
| Noometry Index | 50.1 | 39.1 |
| Released | 2026-02-17 | 2025-12-01 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |
| Context window | 1M | 128K |
| Max output | 128K | 128K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $3 | $0.58 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $15 | $1.68 |
| Results tracked | 57 | 3 |
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Category by category
Coding Claude Sonnet 4.6 leads
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 46.0 (#62), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: 39.9 (#136)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| WeirdML | 66.1% | 46.7% |
| SWE-bench Verified | 75.2% | — |
| DeepSWE | 29.9% | — |
| FrontierCode | 24.3% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1521 | — |
| SciCode | 46.8% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1504 | — |
| ALE-Bench | 1,327 | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 39.1 (#26), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | 53.4% | — |
| APEX-Agents | 43% | — |
| OSWorld 2.0 | 9.3% | — |
| DeepResearch Bench | 54.9% | — |
| OSWorld | 72.1% | — |
| ExploitBench | 23.6% | — |
| GBAEval | 48.8% | — |
| GDP.pdf | 18% | — |
| LMArena Search | 1221 | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 7,204 | — |
Reasoning Claude Sonnet 4.6 leads
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 46.1 (#40), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: 32.1 (#65)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| ARC-AGI-2 | 60.4% | — |
| SimpleBench | — | 52.6% |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 80.9% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 86.5% | — |
| CritPt | 3.1% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 13% | — |
| Thematic Generalization | 76.3% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1485 | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 16% | — |
| DTBench | 89.9% | — |
| LMCA | 46.5% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 152.25 | — |
| ForecastBench | 62 | — |
Math Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 51.9 (#41), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 85.8% | — |
| ProofBench | 45% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1463 | — |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | 32.4% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | 8.3% | — |
Knowledge Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 51.6 (#60), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 87.4% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 35.5% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 10.6% | — |
| LMArena Expert | 1500 | — |
Multimodal Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 38.0 (#61), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1283 | — |
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | 6.7% | — |
| LMArena Document | 1482 | — |
Multilingual Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 54.6 (#39), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1440 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1491 | — |
| LMArena French | 1465 | — |
| LMArena German | 1428 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1419 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1411 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1440 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1465 | — |
Instruction Following Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 77.6 (#23), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1476 | — |
Long Context Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 45.3 (#40), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1479 | — |
Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 4.6 leads
Claude Sonnet 4.6: 70.4 (#22), DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale: 46.1 (#217)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale |
|---|---|---|
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1810 | 1276 |
| LMArena Text | 1458 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1435 | — |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1207 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1464 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Claude Sonnet 4.6 better than DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale?
Claude Sonnet 4.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 50.1 to 39.1 on the Noometry Index. DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale costs 7.0× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 4.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 4.6 or DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale?
DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale is cheaper. It lists at $0.58 per million input tokens and $1.68 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 4.6 lists at $3 and $15.
Is Claude Sonnet 4.6 or DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale better for coding?
Claude Sonnet 4.6 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 46.0 versus 39.9 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Claude Sonnet 4.6 does, with 1M tokens against 128K.
How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 4.6 and DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale share?
2 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 4.6 has 57 scored results on Noometry and DeepSeek-V3.2-Speciale has 3.