o3-mini vs DeepSeek V3.1

Side-by-side benchmark comparison across knowledge, coding, math, and reasoning.

o3-mini is clearly ahead on the aggregate, 56 to 35. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

o3-mini's sharpest advantage is in knowledge, where it averages 82.1 against 29.7. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is MMLU, 86.9 to 33.

o3-mini is the reasoning model in the pair, while DeepSeek V3.1 is not. That usually helps on harder chain-of-thought-heavy tests, but it can also mean more latency and more token spend in real use. o3-mini gives you the larger context window at 200K, compared with 128K for DeepSeek V3.1.

Quick Verdict

Pick o3-mini if you want the stronger benchmark profile. DeepSeek V3.1 only becomes the better choice if you would rather avoid the extra latency and token burn of a reasoning model.

Knowledge

o3-mini

o3-mini

82.1

DeepSeek V3.1

29.7

86.9
MMLU
33
77.2
GPQA
32
-
SuperGPQA
30
-
OpenBookQA
28
-
MMLU-Pro
53
-
HLE
2

Coding

o3-mini

o3-mini

49.3

DeepSeek V3.1

17.7

49.3
SWE-bench Verified
13
-
HumanEval
25
-
LiveCodeBench
15

Mathematics

o3-mini

o3-mini

87.3

DeepSeek V3.1

35.4

87.3
AIME 2024
35
-
AIME 2023
33
-
AIME 2025
34
-
HMMT Feb 2023
29
-
HMMT Feb 2024
31
-
HMMT Feb 2025
30
-
BRUMO 2025
32
-
MATH-500
59

Reasoning

DeepSeek V3.1
-
SimpleQA
31
-
MuSR
29
-
BBH
61

Instruction Following

o3-mini

o3-mini

93.9

DeepSeek V3.1

67

93.9
IFEval
67

Multilingual

DeepSeek V3.1
-
MGSM
64

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, o3-mini or DeepSeek V3.1?

o3-mini is ahead overall, 56 to 35. The biggest single separator in this matchup is MMLU, where the scores are 86.9 and 33.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, o3-mini or DeepSeek V3.1?

o3-mini has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 82.1 versus 29.7. Inside this category, MMLU is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, o3-mini or DeepSeek V3.1?

o3-mini has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 49.3 versus 17.7. Inside this category, SWE-bench Verified is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, o3-mini or DeepSeek V3.1?

o3-mini has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 87.3 versus 35.4. Inside this category, AIME 2024 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, o3-mini or DeepSeek V3.1?

o3-mini has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 93.9 versus 67. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 9, 2026

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