How O3-mini Stacks Up Against DeepSeek‑R1: Speed, Coding Power, and STEM Reasoning

O3-mini

On January 31 OpenAI released o3-mini and o3-mini-high, now available in ChatGPT and the API.

o3-mini is fast for advanced reasoning, while o3-mini-high excels at coding and logic.

Impressively, o3-mini-high scored an average of 82.74 on LiveBench coding, far ahead of o1 (69.69), Claude 3.5 Sonnet (67.13) and DeepSeek‑R1 (66.74).

Free users can also use o3-mini; Plus and Team users receive a limit of 150 messages per day, while Pro users have unlimited access.

Tests show o3-mini is outstanding in coding; many users built games and small apps with a single prompt, such as an 8‑second Twitter clone.

Examples include a Python program visualizing a bouncing sphere inside a rotating hexagon.

o3-mini Optimized for STEM Reasoning

STEM reasoning refers to logical and analytical problem‑solving in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

OpenAI’s o1 remains the broad‑knowledge model, but o3-mini offers a specialized, lower‑latency alternative for science, math and programming.

Mathematical evaluation insights:

At low reasoning effort, o3-mini matches o1-mini performance.

At medium effort, o3-mini equals o1 in math, programming and science while responding faster.

At high effort, o3-mini surpasses o1.

LiveBench shows slight differences in math, but in programming o3-mini outperforms other models even at medium effort and widens its lead at high effort.

In competitive coding, o3-mini’s Elo score rises with increased reasoning effort.

Software‑engineering tests show similar trends.

DeepSeek‑R1

Developed by Chinese AI startup DeepSeek, this open‑source model is recognized for strong reasoning and cost‑effectiveness, providing a competitive alternative to proprietary models.

Further details are omitted.

Model Comparison

Comparison across multiple dimensions follows.

Basic Information

Accessibility, open‑source status and pricing are compared.

Further capability comparisons are presented below.

Evaluation Results

On the GPQA benchmark, o3-mini (mid) and o3-mini (high) outperform DeepSeek‑R1.

On the AIME benchmark, o3-mini‑high exceeds DeepSeek‑R1 by over 10%.

In competitive programming, o3-mini‑high achieves a Codeforces rating of 2,029 versus DeepSeek‑R1’s 1,820, indicating superior coding performance.

Programming Ability

Both models were asked to generate JavaScript animation code that creates six bouncing balls of primary colors that mix colors upon collision.

Generate JavaScript code for a web page that uses canvas to animate six balls (2 blue, 2 red, 2 yellow) moving randomly, bouncing off walls, and mixing colors additively on collision (e.g., yellow+blue=green). Continue mixing on subsequent collisions. Ensure physics‑based smooth motion and embed the code inside a script tag.

Result: O3‑mini runs faster, but its balls disappear after collision; otherwise the outputs are similar.

Online link: https://smjx48.csb.app/index-o3.html

Online link: https://smjx48.csb.app/index-r1.html

Conclusion

Both models are excellent; DeepSeek‑R1 is cheaper and offers solid reasoning, while O3‑mini provides faster response and stronger reasoning. Which do you prefer?