Model comparison
DeepSeek-R1 vs Sonar
DeepSeek-R1 is the stronger model overall, scoring 42.3 to 38.5 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 7 shared benchmarks.
DeepSeek
PerplexitySummary
- They share 7 benchmarks with published results for both. DeepSeek-R1 scores higher in 4 categories and Sonar in 1 category; 4 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in coding, where DeepSeek-R1 leads 46.3 to 35.7.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is LiveBench Math: 80.7% for DeepSeek-R1 and 41.6% for Sonar.
- DeepSeek-R1 is cheaper at $0.50 / $2.15 per million input/output tokens, against $1 / $1 for Sonar.
- DeepSeek-R1 accepts more context: 164K tokens versus 128K.
Side by side
| DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | DeepSeek | Perplexity |
| Noometry Index | 42.3 | 38.5 |
| Released | 2025-01-20 | 2024-01-01 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| Context window | 164K | 128K |
| Max output | 64K | 4K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.50 | $1 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $2.15 | $1 |
| Results tracked | 52 | 7 |
Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry
Category by category
Coding DeepSeek-R1 leads
DeepSeek-R1: 46.3 (#68), Sonar: 35.7 (#221)
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| LiveBench Coding | 66.7% | 35.1% |
| Aider Polyglot | 71.4% | — |
| SciCode | 35.7% | — |
| WeirdML | 41.6% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1427 | — |
| ALE-Bench | 804.12 | — |
| AlgoTune | 1.7 | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
DeepSeek-R1: 30.7 (#75), Sonar: —
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| DeepResearch Bench | 35.1% | — |
| BALROG | 34.9% | — |
| METR Time Horizons | 53.8% | — |
Reasoning Sonar leads
DeepSeek-R1: 18.6 (#278), Sonar: 21.1 (#227)
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| LiveBench Reasoning | 83.2% | 46.3% |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 69.8% | 37.9% |
| LiveBench | 71.6% | 46.9% |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 1.3% | — |
| SimpleBench | 40.8% | — |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 69.4% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 21.2% | — |
| CritPt | 1.1% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1416 | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 141.29 | — |
| ForecastBench | 60 | — |
Math DeepSeek-R1 leads
DeepSeek-R1: 43.8 (#79), Sonar: 33.7 (#200)
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| LiveBench Math | 80.7% | 41.6% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 66.4% | — |
| Omni-MATH | 42.4% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1400 | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 96.6% | — |
Knowledge Not comparable
DeepSeek-R1: 44.5 (#87), Sonar: —
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 76.3% | — |
| MMLU-Pro | 79.3% | — |
| Confabulations | 12.7% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 11.3% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 66.6% | — |
| LMArena Expert | 1394 | — |
Multilingual Not comparable
DeepSeek-R1: 52.4 (#85), Sonar: —
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1412 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1442 | — |
| LMArena French | 1417 | — |
| LMArena German | 1404 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1391 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1360 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1423 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1411 | — |
Instruction Following Too close to call
DeepSeek-R1: 72.0 (#143), Sonar: 71.4 (#150)
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 80.5% | 76.2% |
| IFEval | 78.4% | — |
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1382 | — |
Long Context Not comparable
DeepSeek-R1: 45.4 (#36), Sonar: —
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| Fiction.LiveBench | 75% | — |
| LMArena Longer Query | 1391 | — |
Writing & Preference DeepSeek-R1 leads
DeepSeek-R1: 61.4 (#88), Sonar: 52.6 (#167)
| Benchmark | DeepSeek-R1 | Sonar |
|---|---|---|
| LiveBench Language | 48.5% | 44.1% |
| LMArena Text | 1428 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1405 | — |
| Short-Story Creative Writing | 83% | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1500 | — |
| WildBench | 82.8% | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1405 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is DeepSeek-R1 better than Sonar?
DeepSeek-R1 is the stronger model overall, scoring 42.3 to 38.5 on the Noometry Index.
Which is cheaper, DeepSeek-R1 or Sonar?
DeepSeek-R1 is cheaper. It lists at $0.50 per million input tokens and $2.15 per million output tokens; Sonar lists at $1 and $1.
Is DeepSeek-R1 or Sonar better for coding?
DeepSeek-R1 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 46.3 versus 35.7 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
DeepSeek-R1 does, with 164K tokens against 128K.
How many benchmarks do DeepSeek-R1 and Sonar share?
7 benchmarks have published results for both models. DeepSeek-R1 has 52 scored results on Noometry and Sonar has 7.