DeepSeek Vision API Pricing (2026): What an Image Actually Costs

The current model is deepseek-flash, version DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash. Legacy names deepseek-v4-flash and deepseek-v4-flash-vision-exp are retired; requests using these aliases are temporarily routed to the current Flash model. Legacy capabilities and rates should not be presented as current.

Current rate table (USD per 1M tokens)

Rate	Off-peak	Peak
Input — cache hit	$0.003	$0.006
Input — cache miss	$0.15	$0.30
Output	$0.60	$1.20

Official USD list prices, not relay prices or a currency conversion. Prices can change.

Peak hours in UTC are 01:00-04:00 and 06:00-10:00, Monday through Friday excluding Chinese public holidays. All other hours, including weekends and Chinese public holidays, are off-peak.

Image input and request costs

Each image is billed by actual token usage, with an upper bound of 1024 tokens per image. Multiple images are counted independently. After resizing, images span roughly 544x544 to 1300x1300 pixels. Billing covers image tokens plus text input and output tokens.

A single image consuming 1024 tokens costs $0.0003072 during peak hours and $0.0001536 off-peak, using the cache-miss rate. This figure covers the image input only; a full request also incurs text input and output token charges.

Check billed token usage rather than assuming every image consumes the maximum.

FAQ

Which DeepSeek Flash model is current?

DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash, served as deepseek-flash. The older deepseek-v4-flash and deepseek-v4-flash-vision-exp names are retired and currently route to this model.

What does image input cost?

Images are billed by actual tokens, capped at 1024 tokens per image; a full 1024-token image costs $0.0003072 peak or $0.0001536 off-peak at cache-miss rates, excluding text and output tokens.