On May 22nd, Anthropic released Claude's Sonnet 4 and Opus 4. These next-generation Claude models set new standards for coding, advanced reasoning, and AI agents. This time, Claude offers the best coding and problem-solving standards.

With this significant update in the world of AI, it's a perfect time to compare this new model with the ones already doing great in this space, Deepseek R1 and Qwen 3.

Deepseek has been gaining attention for its ability to handle problem-solving and show its work step by step, while Qwen 3 stands out for its strong multilingual understanding and detailed, accurate reasoning. In this blog, we'll take a closer look at what each model is good at, how they differ, and which one might be better for your needs.

TL;DR

Claude 4 and Deepseek R1 are both strong coding models, but they have different strengths. Claude 4 is great for creating realistic, production-ready code that integrates well with real-world tools. On the other hand, Deepseek R1 is excellent for open-source projects and has strong math and coding skills, but it seems more academic and less refined for practical UI or full-stack development.

• Claude 4: Best for professional apps, realistic UIs, and full-stack workflows with smooth code and a deeper understanding.

• Deepseek R1: Best for quick, benchmark-focused tasks and algorithmic coding, but its outputs sometimes feel basic for production apps.

• Qwen 3: Ideal for general coding tasks, turning rough ideas into working code, and maintaining a balance between creativity and practicality.

Brief on Claude 4

Anthropic recently released Claude 4, which includes two models: Opus 4 and Sonnet 4. Both have made a strong impression on developers and AI enthusiasts.

Claude Opus 4 is their most advanced model so far, known for handling long, complex coding tasks with accuracy and precision.

In testing, it outperformed all other models on real-world software engineering benchmarks, including SWE-bench, where it scored an impressive 72.7%. Claude Sonnet 4 also showed major improvements over the previous Sonnet 3.7, offering faster, more precise responses and better understanding of developer instructions.

But what makes Claude 4 stand out isn't just the benchmarks. It's the way both models handle real codebases. From solving multi-file issues to fixing deep architectural problems without shortcuts, Claude 4 feels like a step closer to having a true coding partner.

Here's what makes Claude 4 a true coding partner:

• Seamless IDE integrations – Works natively with VS Code, JetBrains, and GitHub to suggest, edit, and debug code directly in your files.

• Extended thinking with tools – Can reason for hours using web search or custom tools, executing deeper workflows without losing context.

• Agent-ready memory system – Maintains and references long-term memory files for better continuity in multi-step agent tasks.

• Parallel tool use – Can execute multiple tools simultaneously, improving speed and efficiency during complex operations.

• Automated CI/CD improvements – Integrates with GitHub Actions to perform background tasks, fix CI errors, and respond to reviews.

If you're looking for an AI that truly understands code and doesn't just patch things at the surface, Claude 4 is worth a try.

Brief on DeepSeek R1

DeepSeek R1 is a standout open-source AI model from China, gaining global attention for its impressive performance and affordability. Built with a unique Mixture-of-Experts (MoE) architecture, it activates only 37 billion of its 671 billion parameters per task, ensuring efficient computation without compromising capability.

In benchmark tests, DeepSeek R1 excels: it achieved a 97.3% accuracy on the MATH-500 benchmark, surpassing many competitors, and scored 96.3% on Codeforces, demonstrating strong coding proficiency. Its reasoning abilities are also notable, with a 90.8% score on the MMLU benchmark, closely rivaling leading models.

What sets DeepSeek R1 apart is its accessibility. Released under an open-source MIT license, it's freely available for use and modification. Additionally, its API is cost-effective, priced at approximately $0.55 per million input tokens and $2.19 per million output tokens, making advanced AI more accessible to developers and businesses alike.

DeepSeek R1 is a big step in making AI more accessible, providing strong performance without the usual high costs of these models.

Brief on Qwen3

Qwen 3 is the latest generation of open-weight large language models from Alibaba, designed to deliver high performance across a wide range of tasks, including coding, math, multilingual reasoning, and agentic workflows. The flagship MoE model, Qwen3-235B-A22B, with 22B activated parameters, performs competitively with top-tier models like DeepSeek-R1, o1, o3-mini, Grok-3, and Gemini 2.5 Pro. Even its smaller variants, like Qwen3-4B, rival much larger models such as Qwen2.5-72 B.

Qwen 3 comes in both dense and MoE variants, all open-weighted under the Apache 2.0 license. With support for 128K context length, 119 languages and dialects, and a flexible hybrid thinking mode (step-by-step reasoning or fast response), Qwen 3 is built to be adaptable, efficient, and powerful.

Key features:

• Expanded pretraining data: Trained on 36 trillion tokens with rich math, code, and multilingual datasets.

• Hybrid Thinking Modes: Let users choose between deliberate reasoning and fast inference.

• Improved Agentic Capabilities: Strengthened interaction skills and task completion logic.

• Efficient MoE Architecture: Comparable performance to much larger dense models while using fewer active parameters.

Qwen 3 is available on major platforms like Hugging Face, ModelScope, and Kaggle. It integrates smoothly with tools like Ollama, vLLM, SGLang, and LM Studio, making it easy to use in local or cloud environments.

Comparison Claude 4 vs Deepseek R1 vs Qwen3

We briefly looked at the capabilities of the Deepseek R1 and Claude Sonnet 4. Now it's time to test both of them. We'll give the same type of coding prompt to each and see how they perform.

So, let's start with the first task.

Create a Solar System using Three.js

Deepseek R1

Let's start with Deepseek R1. I am going to give this prompt:

Prompt: Create a 3D simulation of the solar system. Planets should revolve around the sun and rotate on their axes. Bonus if each planet's speed and size are somewhat realistic. In HTML, CSS, JS, and with Three JS

And, it came with this result.

Yes, it's good, but a lot of improvement is needed. Because currently it's not looking that attractive and real.

Code:

Claude Sonnet 4

I used the same prompt for Claude as well. And, it came up with this result.

This one is quite strange. It doesn't show orbits, I can't zoom in, and the planets mostly look black and too small to see clearly. So, we might need to give Qwen 3 more detailed instructions to create this 3D Solar System.

Qwen3

I used the same prompt for Qwen3 as well. And, it came up with this result.

This one is quite strange. It doesn't show orbits, I can't zoom in, and the planets mostly look black and too small to see clearly. So, we might need to give Claude 4 more detailed instructions to create this 3D Solar System.

Code:

Create a Fashion Website using GSAP

The first task is complete, so let's move on to the next one. We'll start with Claude 4. I used this prompt:

Prompt: Use html css and js and create a fashion website clothing website. Use creative GSAP Animation and make sure the site must be responsive. There will be a landing page with all functionality of add to card and buy and each and everything must be creatively animated using GSAP. Must have option to search product view product different category and view, moving, and going through one page to another must be a animated using GSAP. Animation must be smooth and silky. Also add smooth like buttery scroll animation.

And, Claude 4 comes up with this result.

It created a website with GSAP animation and features for adding items to the cart and checking out. However, it didn't add the images, but it included all the functionality I mentioned. It added features for checkout, adding to cart, adding to favorites, and a search option. Although the site isn't very responsive and uses emojis instead of icons.

The rest is good.

Qwen 3

I've used the same prompt with Qwen 3 as well, and this is what it came up with:

The site looks pretty decent. It has products, search functionality, and some images. But, it didn't add most of the functionalities like Claude did, and it doesn't include GSAP animations. Overall, it needs a lot of improvements.

Deepseek R1

With the same prompt, I tried Deepseek R1, and this is what it came up with:

This result really amazed me. I wasn't expecting this much, but it turned out to be a fabulous fashion website. It uses proper icons, smooth and buttery GSAP animations, and appropriate images by default. The site is fully responsive, and it added a beautiful logo loading animation. Overall, it won me over completely. It's a clear winner in this case.

The only thing it didn't do was the functionality. It didn't add features for checkout, add to cart, or search. So, while the UI works well, it might need a few more prompts to complete the functionality.

Bullet Dodge Game

Now, let's do one more test with a new prompt. This time, I am going to use this prompt:

Prompt: Make a bullet dodging game (top-down view) using HTML Canvas. The player is a small character that can move in all directions. Bullets shoot from all sides in patterns. The player must avoid being hit for as long as possible. Add increasing difficulty over time.

Qwen 3

Let's submit this prompt for Qwen 3 first. And it came up with this result:

It created the game, but when I played, I couldn't move at all. If you watch the video closely, you'll notice I'm trying to move the green ball, but it stays stuck in a specific circular area. So, it didn't work well. Let's check the next ones.

Code:

Deepseek R1

Let's submit this prompt for Deepseek R1. And it came up with this result:

This looks good. The Neon UI is nice, and the movement of the player and enemies is smooth. If you watch the video closely, you can see that when I move the player, it leaves traces behind, so I know where I started and how much area I've covered. The difficulty increases automatically based on how long I survive. Overall, I really liked this one.

Code:

Claude 4

I submitted the same prompt to Claude 4, and it came up with this result.

Now, Claude 4's results are also similar to Deepseek R1. It features a Neon theme, dynamic difficulty, displays the current level, and has a great UI. As for the code, Claude 4 wrote very good and clean code. It properly set the variables and divided the code into separate, easy-to-understand short functions.

In this case, it's too close to decide which one did better between Claude 4 and Deepseek R1 because both did a fantastic job creating this Dodgeball Game. Qwen 3 lagged a bit in this case.

Code:

Which One Should You Choose?

Conclusion

That's it for this blog. Claude 4, Deepseek R1, and Qwen 3 all did a great job, making it hard to choose between them. The best choice depends on what you need and the tasks you want to do. If you prefer detailed explanations and clear reasoning, Deepseek R1 is the way to go. If you want high-quality coding and the latest production-ready code, Claude 4 is a great option. Or if you need a flexible model that can turn incomplete ideas into working code, Qwen 3 is a good choice. It's ideal for solo developers, quick prototyping, and projects that combine logic, UI, and language.

Each model is strong in its own way, so choose the one that suits your needs best. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next blog!