Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct vs DeepSeek R1 0528 vs Claude Haiku 4.5
Claude Haiku 4.5 comes out ahead, 66 to 60 and 58 on our weighted score, though DeepSeek R1 0528 is 2.1× cheaper per token.
ByteDance SeedSeed-OSS-36B-Instruct
60/100- ECI—
- Price—
- Context524K
DeepSeekDeepSeek R1 0528
58/100- ECI141.2
- Price$0.512 / $2.19
- Context164K
- Our pick
AnthropicClaude Haiku 4.5
66/100- ECI142.2
- Price$1.00 / $5.00
- Context200K
Claude Haiku 4.5 is our pick
Claude Haiku 4.5 is the better all-round choice, scoring 66/100 against Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct (60) and DeepSeek R1 0528 (58). It leads on inputs & features. Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct wins on context window. DeepSeek R1 0528 wins on capability. The score weighs capability 67%, inputs & features 20%, context window 13%. Capability uses the average of shared benchmarks (GPQA Diamond and OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025), because Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct has no Capabilities Index score yet.
- CapabilityDeepSeek R1 0528Shared benchmarks: DeepSeek R1 0528 71.4% · Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct 69.5% · Claude Haiku 4.5 68.9%
- Lowest priceDeepSeek R1 0528DeepSeek R1 0528 $0.932 · Claude Haiku 4.5 $2.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend) · Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct unpriced
- Longest contextSeed-OSS-36B-InstructSeed-OSS-36B-Instruct 524,288 · Claude Haiku 4.5 200,000 · DeepSeek R1 0528 163,840 tokens
- Widest inputsClaude Haiku 4.5Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct: Text · DeepSeek R1 0528: Text · Claude Haiku 4.5: Text, Images, PDFs
- Self-hostingSeed-OSS-36B-Instruct and DeepSeek R1 0528Publishes downloadable weights (Apache 2.0 and MIT)
| Measure | Weight | Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct | DeepSeek R1 0528 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CapabilityShared benchmarks | 67% | 70 | 71 | 69 |
| Inputs & features | 20% | 35 | 35 | 80 |
| Context window | 13% | 49 | 28 | 32 |
| Overall | 100% | 60/100 | 58/100 | 66/100 |
Left out because at least one model lacks the data: price. The remaining weights were rescaled.
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Seed-OSS-36B-InstructByteDance Seed | DeepSeek R1 0528DeepSeek | Claude Haiku 4.5Anthropic |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | — | 141.2 | 142.2 (best) |
| ECI rank | — | #108 of 165 | #102 of 165 (best) |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 71.5% | 76.3% (best) | 71.2% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 67.5% (best) | 66.4% | 66.7% |
| SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions | — | — | 13.2% |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | — | $0.512 (best) | $1.00 |
| Output | — | $2.19 (best) | $5.00 |
| Cached input | — | — | $0.10 |
| Blended (3:1) | — | $0.932 (best) | $2.00 |
| Long-context rate | — | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | — | Median of 16 providers | Official Anthropic API |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 524,288 tokens (best) | 163,840 tokens | 200,000 tokens |
| Max output | 524,288 tokens (best) | 32,768 tokens | 64,000 tokens |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | No | No | Yes |
| PDFs | No | No | Yes |
| Audio | No | No | No |
| Video | No | No | No |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | No | No | Yes |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | OpenApache 2.0 | OpenMIT | Proprietary |
| API model ID | — | — | claude-haiku-4-5 |
| API providers | — | 16 | 48 (best) |
| Released | Aug 20, 2025 | May 28, 2025 | Oct 15, 2025 |
| Knowledge cutoff | Jul 2024 | — | Feb 28, 2025 |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct—
- DeepSeek R1 0528$9.50
- Claude Haiku 4.5$20.00
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct, DeepSeek R1 0528 or Claude Haiku 4.5?
Claude Haiku 4.5 is the better all-round choice, scoring 66/100 against Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct (60) and DeepSeek R1 0528 (58). It leads on inputs & features. Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct wins on context window. DeepSeek R1 0528 wins on capability. The score weighs capability 67%, inputs & features 20%, context window 13%. Capability uses the average of shared benchmarks (GPQA Diamond and OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025), because Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct has no Capabilities Index score yet.
Which is cheaper, Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct, DeepSeek R1 0528 or Claude Haiku 4.5?
DeepSeek R1 0528 is cheaper at $0.512 input / $2.19 output per million tokens (median across 16 API providers). Claude Haiku 4.5 costs $1.00 input / $5.00 output per million tokens (official Anthropic API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.932 per million tokens for DeepSeek R1 0528 versus $2.00 for Claude Haiku 4.5 (2.1× as much). Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct has no published per-token price.
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
Not every model here has a Capabilities Index score, so we compare the average of shared benchmarks (GPQA Diamond and OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025): DeepSeek R1 0528 71.4%, Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct 69.5% and Claude Haiku 4.5 68.9%. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — DeepSeek R1 0528 76.3%, Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct 71.5%, Claude Haiku 4.5 71.2%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct 67.5%, Claude Haiku 4.5 66.7%, DeepSeek R1 0528 66.4%.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct, DeepSeek R1 0528 and Claude Haiku 4.5 yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, DeepSeek R1 0528 leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.
Which has the bigger context window?
Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct has the largest context window at 524,288 tokens, against 200,000 for Claude Haiku 4.5 and 163,840 for DeepSeek R1 0528. Maximum output per response: Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct up to 524,288, DeepSeek R1 0528 up to 32,768, Claude Haiku 4.5 up to 64,000 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct accepts text; DeepSeek R1 0528 accepts text; Claude Haiku 4.5 accepts text, images and PDFs. Claude Haiku 4.5 handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct and DeepSeek R1 0528 publishes its weights (Apache 2.0 and MIT) and can be self-hosted; Claude Haiku 4.5 is proprietary.
Which is newer?
Claude Haiku 4.5 is the newest, released Oct 15, 2025. Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct came out Aug 20, 2025; DeepSeek R1 0528 came out May 28, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct Jul 2024, Claude Haiku 4.5 Feb 28, 2025.
How do you decide the winner?
Each model gets a 0–100 score on capability (50%, independent benchmark results); price (25%, blended price per million tokens (3 input : 1 output), log scale); inputs & features (15%, image, PDF, audio and video input, tool calling, structured output and reasoning); context window (10%, maximum tokens per request, log scale). Dimensions missing for any model are dropped and the remaining weights rescaled, so every model is judged on the same evidence. Specs and prices come from public model listings and the labs’ own API pages; capability scores come from independent benchmark runs. Data updated Nov 2, 2026.
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