DeepSeek API: Cheap Power for Developers

First Call

curl https://api.deepseek.com/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $DEEPSEEK_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"model": "deepseek-chat", "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "Explain indexes in one paragraph"}]}'

Why Teams Switch

OpenAI-compatible format means changing endpoints, not code. Reasoning models at commodity prices unlock batch jobs (classification, extraction, evaluation) that were uneconomical before.

Production Rules

Keys stay server-side. Pin model versions. Cache aggressively, log tokens per feature, and cap spend per key so one bug cannot bill you.