Best Chinese LLM APIs in 2026
Updated 2026-10-29. Official prices, LMArena ranks.
The best Chinese LLM API for quality right now is Kimi K3.1 Pro from Kimi: #6 of 50 priced models on LMArena's Code Arena, at $2 input and $10 output per 1M tokens. The best value is MiMo-V2.6 Flash ($0.14 / $0.28), which scores 36 out of 100 on the same board. For comparison, Claude Opus 5.5 leads Code Arena at $4 / $20. Prices are official list prices checked 2026-10-29.
| Pick | In / out | Code rank | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kimi K3.1 Pro | $2 / $10 | #6 | Best overall: the highest Code Arena rank of any Chinese model we price. |
| Qwen3.8 Max | $2 / $6 | #10 | Holds its own: nothing here is both cheaper and ranked higher. |
| DeepSeek V4.1 Flash | $0.30 / $1.20 | #12 | Holds its own: nothing here is both cheaper and ranked higher. |
| MiMo-V2.6 Flash | $0.14 / $0.28 | #17 | Best value: 36 out of 100 on Code Arena for $0.18 blended. |
| Hunyuan Hy4 Preview | $0.83 / $2.50 | #18 | Outranked and undercut by DeepSeek V4.1 Flash. It needs another reason to pick it. |
| GLM-5.3 | $1.40 / $4.40 | #20 | Outranked and undercut by DeepSeek V4.1 Flash. It needs another reason to pick it. |
| MiniMax-M3.1 Flash | $0.15 / $0.60 | #26 | Outranked and undercut by MiMo-V2.6 Flash. It needs another reason to pick it. |
| Step 5 Preview | $1 / $2.70 | #28 | Outranked and undercut by DeepSeek V4.1 Flash. It needs another reason to pick it. |
| ERNIE 5.1 | $0.56 / $2.53 | n/a | Outranked and undercut by DeepSeek V4.1 Flash. It needs another reason to pick it. |
| Seed 2.0 Pro | $0.50 / $3 | n/a | Outranked and undercut by DeepSeek V4.1 Flash. It needs another reason to pick it. |
Pick = each lab's best-ranked current model on Code Arena, or Text Arena where it has no coding rank. Rank is among the models in our price table. Legacy and speed-tier variants are excluded.
Which Chinese LLM API for which job
- Coding: Kimi K3.1 Pro ($2 in, $10 out), #6 of 50 on Code Arena. Claude Opus 5.5 costs $8 blended and is #1 on Code Arena; Kimi K3.1 Pro is 2.0x cheaper and #6.
- Cheap coding: MiMo-V2.6 Flash scores 36 out of 100 on Code Arena at $0.14 in and $0.28 out, 23x cheaper blended than Kimi K3.1 Pro.
- Agents and tool use: MiMo-V2.6 Pro, #11 of 34 on Agent Arena at $0.43 in and $0.87 out.
- Math and reasoning: Qwen3.8 Max, #9 of 51 on the Text Arena math board, $2 in and $6 out.
- Everyday chat: Kimi K3, #8 of 51 on Text Arena at $3 in and $15 out.
- Long documents: Qwen3.7 Flash has a 1M-token window at $0.03 in and $0.13 out, the cheapest 1M-context model from these labs.
- Cheapest of all: Qwen3.7 Flash at $0.03 in and $0.13 out, number 1 of 77 on our full list. LMArena doesn't rank it, so check quality on your own prompts first.
How they stack up against Western flagships
- Kimi K3.1 Pro vs Claude Opus 5.5: $4 vs $8 blended, #6 vs #1 on Code Arena.
- Qwen3.8 Max vs GPT-6.1 Terra: $3 vs $2 blended, #10 vs #11 on Code Arena.
- GLM-5.3 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5: $2.15 vs $4 blended, #20 vs #3 on Code Arena.
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash vs Claude Haiku 5.5: $0.52 vs $0.20 blended, #12 vs #24 on Code Arena.
- Kimi K3.1 Pro vs DeepSeek V4 Pro and GLM-5.3 vs Qwen3.8 Max settle the Chinese flagship question.
Read this before you sign up
- Region prices: Qwen is the Singapore price, Xiaomi MiMo the overseas USD price, Tencent Hunyuan the Singapore region price, and ByteDance Seed the BytePlus ModelArk price. Mainland China pricing differs.
- Retiring models: Moonshot closes Kimi K2.6 and K2.7 Code to new sign-ups from Oct 31, 2026 and plans to retire the K2 series by the end of December.
- Preview models: Tencent Hy4 and StepFun Step 5 are labeled preview on their official pages, and prices can change at launch.
Provider pages with every model: DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM (Z.ai), MiniMax, ByteDance Seed, Tencent Hunyuan, Baidu ERNIE, StepFun, Xiaomi MiMo.
Sources
FAQ
What is the best Chinese LLM API?
Kimi K3.1 Pro ranks highest of the Chinese models we price, #6 on LMArena's Code Arena, at $2 input and $10 output per 1M tokens.
What is the cheapest Chinese LLM API?
Qwen3.7 Flash from Qwen at $0.03 input and $0.13 output per 1M tokens, as of 2026-10-29. It isn't ranked on LMArena.
Is Kimi better than DeepSeek?
On Code Arena, Kimi K3.1 Pro ranks #6 and DeepSeek V4.1 Flash #12, but Kimi costs 7.6x more blended. DeepSeek V4 Pro ranks #38.
Are Chinese LLM APIs cheaper than OpenAI and Anthropic?
Mostly, yes. The median blended price across the Chinese models we track is $1.05 per 1M tokens, against $4.50 for OpenAI and Anthropic models.
Can I use these APIs outside China?
Yes. We list the international prices from each lab's English pricing page. Check the provider's terms for your country before building on it.
Which Chinese lab has the most models?
Qwen, with 18 priced models, then GLM with 8 and Kimi with 6.
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