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DeepSeek VL2 Small vs LongCat-2.5

LongCat-2.5 leads the LLM Stats Score 50.0 to 0.7.

DeepSeek · Meituan · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

LongCat-2.5 leads the overall LLM Stats Score 50.0 to 0.7, ranking #20 overall.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose DeepSeek VL2 Small

  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

Choose LongCat-2.5

  • overall performance matters — it scores 50.0 and ranks #20 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning — it leads those capability indexes
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Nov 2026

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

DeepSeek VL2 Small
DeepSeek
LongCat-2.5
Meituan
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
0.7
#361
50.0
#20
Reasoning
-4.5
#380
48.3
#21
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
—
—
Input price
— / M
$0.30 / M
Output price
— / M
$1.20 / M
Context window
—
1,048,576

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

2 shared
Index
DeepSeek VL2 Small
LongCat-2.5
Vision
0.3#209
32.5#29
Multimodal
2.7#167
34.8#15
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

14 reported for DeepSeek VL2 Small · 23 for LongCat-2.5

No common benchmarks found

DeepSeek VL2 Small and LongCat-2.5don't have any common benchmark datasets to compare. They may have been evaluated on different testing suites.

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

1584.0B diff

LongCat-2.5 has 1584.0B more parameters than DeepSeek VL2 Small, making it 9900.0% larger.

DeepSeek
DeepSeek VL2 Small
16.0Bparameters
Meituan
LongCat-2.5
1.6Tparameters
16.0B
DeepSeek VL2 Small
1600.0B
LongCat-2.5

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only LongCat-2.5 specifies input context (1,048,576 tokens). Only LongCat-2.5 specifies output context (131,072 tokens).

DeepSeek
DeepSeek VL2 Small
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Meituan
LongCat-2.5
Input1,048,576 tokens
Output131,072 tokens
Wed Nov 04 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Both DeepSeek VL2 Small and LongCat-2.5 support multimodal inputs.

They are both capable of processing various types of data, offering versatility in application.

DeepSeek VL2 Small

Text
Images
Audio
Video

LongCat-2.5

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

DeepSeek VL2 Small was released on 2024-12-13, while LongCat-2.5 was released on 2026-11-01.

LongCat-2.5 is 23 months newer than DeepSeek VL2 Small.

DeepSeek VL2 Small

Dec 13, 2024

1.9 years ago

LongCat-2.5

Nov 1, 2026

3 days ago

1.9yr newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against DeepSeek VL2 Small and LongCat-2.5 side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

DeepSeek VL2 Small
✓ Preferred
LongCat-2.5
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about DeepSeek VL2 Small vs LongCat-2.5.

Which is better, DeepSeek VL2 Small or LongCat-2.5?

LongCat-2.5 leads the LLM Stats Score 50.0 to 0.7. DeepSeek VL2 Small is made by DeepSeek and LongCat-2.5 is made by Meituan. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does DeepSeek VL2 Small compare to LongCat-2.5 in benchmarks?

DeepSeek VL2 Small scores DocVQA: 92.3%, ChartQA: 84.5%, OCRBench: 83.4%, TextVQA: 83.4%, MMBench: 80.3%. LongCat-2.5 scores MathVision: 96.5%, BrowseComp: 91.9%, CharXiv-R: 90.2%, Terminal-Bench 2.1: 88.4%, Video-MME: 85.2%.

What are the context window sizes for DeepSeek VL2 Small and LongCat-2.5?

DeepSeek VL2 Small supports an unknown number of tokens and LongCat-2.5 supports 1.0M tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between DeepSeek VL2 Small and LongCat-2.5?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (0.7 vs 50.0), licensing (deepseek vs Unknown). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes DeepSeek VL2 Small and LongCat-2.5?

DeepSeek VL2 Small is developed by DeepSeek and LongCat-2.5 is developed by Meituan.

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