After triggering price war, DeepSeek reverses course with surcharge on peak-hour API use

The Chinese AI champion will double the price for access to its V4 AI models through its application programming interface (API) during peak hours – 9am to noon and 2pm to 6pm Beijing time – according to an email sent to service subscribers on Monday and seen by the South China Morning Post.

Hangzhou-based DeepSeek attributed the price increase to the need for “better distribution of resources and [to] enhance service stability”, according to the email.

Under the new pricing, peak hour costs for its V4 Pro will be increased to 12 yuan (US$1.77) for every million output tokens from the standard rate of 6 yuan during non-peak time. The new price applies to all V4 models, the company said in a separate notice published to its website.

AI companies sell access to their models via APIs and typically charge fees based on token usage, usually per million tokens.