Chinese AI Models Comparison 2026
Pricing verified as of 2026-08-19. DeepSeek changed to peak/off-peak pricing on 2026-08-17.
The definitive side-by-side comparison of China's top LLMs — DeepSeek GLM Kimi ERNIE — for developers choosing an AI API. Pricing, speed, context windows, and real-world benchmarks. All accessible through one OpenAI-compatible API.
🎯 All 4 models. One API key. A $5 minimum top-up.
No per-model registration. Email or GitHub account options are available. Start comparing in 5 minutes.
Explore listed model routes →Pricing Comparison (per 1M tokens, USD)
| Model | Input | Output | vs GPT-4 | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek V4 Pro | $1.914 | $5.742 | Recalculate with dated rates. | Coding, math, reasoning |
| DeepSeek Reasoner R1 | $1.914 | $5.742 | Recalculate with dated rates. | Complex chain-of-thought |
| GLM-5 | $0.15 | $0.30 | Recalculate with dated rates. | General purpose, cheap API |
| Kimi K2 | $0.30 | $0.60 | Recalculate with dated rates. | Long context (200K) |
| ERNIE 4.0 | $0.12 | $0.12 | Recalculate with dated rates. | Chinese-language tasks |
| GPT-4 comparison: $30/$60 per 1M tokens (in/out). Chinese models at AIWave include markup for API gateway service. | ||||
Technical Specs
| Model | Context Window | Max Output | Avg Latency | Vision | Function Calling |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek V4 Pro | 128K | 8K | ~0.8s | ✅ | ✅ |
| DeepSeek R1 | 128K | 32K | ~15s (thinking) | ❌ | ❌ |
| GLM-5 | 128K | 4K | ~1.3s | ✅ | ✅ |
| Kimi K2 | 200K | 8K | ~1.6s | ❌ | ✅ |
| ERNIE 4.0 | 8K | 2K | ~1.0s | ✅ | ✅ |
Use Case Matrix
| Use Case | Best Model | Budget Pick | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| Code generation | DeepSeek V4 Pro | GLM-5 | DeepSeek trained on massive code corpus |
| Math / logic | DeepSeek R1 | Kimi K2 | Chain-of-thought reasoning built-in |
| Long doc analysis | Kimi K2 | DeepSeek V4 | 200K context handles entire books |
| Chatbots | GLM-5 | ERNIE 4.0 | GLM is responsive and cheap |
| Chinese content | ERNIE 4.0 | GLM-5 | Native Chinese training data |
| Image understanding | GLM-5 | DeepSeek V4 | Best Chinese-language vision model |
| Production API | DeepSeek V4 Pro | GLM-5 | Fastest, most reliable |
The AIWave Advantage
| Method | Accounts Needed | Phone Verification | Monthly Minimum | API Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Register each provider directly | 4+ accounts | ❌ Chinese phone ×4 | Varies | 4 different formats |
| AIWave API Gateway | 1 account | ✅ None | ✅ $0 | ✅ One OpenAI format |
💡 Strategy: Smart developers use model routing — send simple requests to cheap GLM-5, complex reasoning to DeepSeek R1, and long documents to Kimi K2. With AIWave, you swap models by changing one parameter:
model: "deepseek-v4-pro" → model: "kimi-k2".
Related Guides
- Kimi API Complete Guide →
- DeepSeek Reasoner R1 Deep Dive →
- AI API Cost Comparison (Real Numbers) →
- Multi-Model Fallback & Retry Patterns →
DeepSeek V4 API pricing · GLM-5 API pricing · Kimi API pricing · Qwen API pricing · ERNIE API pricing · OpenAI-compatible API docs · Chinese model comparison