Model Comparison
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B vs o4-miniWhich is better in 2026?
o4-mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Verdict: DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B vs o4-mini — which is better?
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B (by DeepSeek) and o4-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 o4-mini is better at 2 benchmarks (AIME 2024, GPQA). o4-mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Choose DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B if…
- you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune
Choose o4-mini if…
- you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 2 of 2 shared benchmarks
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Apr 2025
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while o4-mini is better at 2 benchmarks (AIME 2024, GPQA).
o4-mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Arena Performance
Human preference votes
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only o4-mini specifies input context (200,000 tokens). Only o4-mini specifies output context (100,000 tokens).
Input Capabilities
Supported data types and modalities
o4-mini supports multimodal inputs, whereas DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B does not.
o4-mini can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B
o4-mini
License
Usage and distribution terms
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B is licensed under MIT, while o4-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 o4-mini was released on 2025-04-16.
o4-mini is 3 months newer than DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B.
Jan 20, 2025
1.4 years ago
Apr 16, 2025
1.1 years ago
2mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
o4-mini has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2024-05-31, while DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm o4-mini's training data extends to 2024-05-31, but cannot make a direct comparison without DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B's cutoff date.
—
May 2024
Outputs Comparison
Key Takeaways
o4-mini
View detailsOpenAI
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5Bo4-miniDetailed Comparison
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FAQ
Common questions about DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 1.5B vs o4-mini.