Model Comparison
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B vs GPT-4o miniWhich is better in 2026?
GPT-4o mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Verdict: DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B vs GPT-4o mini — which is better?
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B (by DeepSeek) and GPT-4o mini (by OpenAI) are two of the AI models people compare most. Here is how they stack up on benchmarks, price and capabilities, and which one to pick in 2026.
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while GPT-4o mini is better at 1 benchmark (GPQA). GPT-4o mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Choose DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B if…
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Jan 2025
- you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune
Choose GPT-4o mini if…
- you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 1 of 1 shared benchmarks
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while GPT-4o mini is better at 1 benchmark (GPQA).
GPT-4o mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Arena Performance
Human preference votes
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only GPT-4o mini specifies input context (128,000 tokens). Only GPT-4o mini specifies output context (16,384 tokens).
Input Capabilities
Supported data types and modalities
GPT-4o mini supports multimodal inputs, whereas DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B does not.
GPT-4o mini can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B
GPT-4o mini
License
Usage and distribution terms
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B is licensed under MIT, while GPT-4o mini uses a proprietary license.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
MIT
Open weights
Proprietary
Closed source
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B was released on 2025-01-20, while GPT-4o mini was released on 2024-07-18.
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B is 6 months newer than GPT-4o mini.
Jan 20, 2025
1.4 years ago
6mo newerJul 18, 2024
1.9 years ago
Knowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
GPT-4o mini has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-10-01, while DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm GPT-4o mini's training data extends to 2023-10-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B's cutoff date.
—
Oct 2023
Outputs Comparison
Key Takeaways
GPT-4o mini
View detailsOpenAI
Detailed Comparison
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FAQ
Common questions about DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B vs GPT-4o mini.