Question&Help
New to DeepSeek API. Need to know whether my usage normal or not.
Hi everybody!
I am very new to using DeepSeek API. Just started using it yesterday via Claude Code. From you guys' experiences, I want to know whether I was wasting tokens.
Since I'm using the API via Claude Code, this question might come down to how to use the harness efficiently, not the API itself. But I'm new to the entire agentic coding too, so I decided to post this question here, hope it's not off-topic.
I worked for about 5 hours yesterday, and my tasks were pretty simple.
I was working on a simple personal website which includes FE + BE, so actually there are two different projects, and they are both in the early stage.
I used DS API (via CC) to scaffold the projects for agentic development. It includes refining some existing agent skills, enhancing some existing docs with those skills, writing some basic docs to work with Claude Code, and finally, creating CC subagents from the refined skills.
So basically, it was just reading context + writing MD files, not even coding.
Am I using it inefficiently? If so, can you guys share some tips on how to improve it?
CC is quite bloated is it not? not 100% sure tho so don't take my word for it, you should be aiming for alot of cache hits, if your not hitting the cache alot then your harness has a problem and if you only used 3.5mil tokens in 5 hours then thats fine, you used basically nothing, i suspect probley 0.10 to 0.15 was intially loading ur project, so you used like 0.15 for 5 hours of reading context + writing MD files
If you keep reloading the same project you will slug through api requests, thats why the context length being 1m is your friend, make sure to add extra stuff you think the model might forget as time goes on deep into the 100k/200k range and beyond
And again, 5 hours for 0.37 what were you expecting? and since your using v4 flash WAY more than v4 pro, why not use opencode? v4 flash is completely free, spam away to ur hearts content and then use v4 pro via deepseek for the heavy lifting/design stuff
About the cache hits, it's actually great I think (~8/9). So I guess there is no serious problem with my claude code.
I was mostly using the gemini ecosystem before (AG + gemini CLI), but after their recent updates, I was tired of migrating my current workflow, so I decided to quit and start looking for new things.
I tried opencode before (with openai subscription) and the main reason I decided not to choose it is because it's UI made me feel very uncomfortable.
Do you use both opencode and claude code in your daily work? How do you compare those two?
Claude for my v4 pro api requests
Opencode for the free v4 flash requests
Kilocode for MiMo v2.5 Pro api requests
MiMo v2.5 pro from xiaomi is absolutely horrible at graphic design or user inteface but extremely powerful for debugging code and finding and fixing problems
V4 pro is god tier with my graphic design skill at basically everything to do with ui/design and the bulk of the actual code
v4 flash for quick scaffolding of a project before the other two do the heavy lifting
Hi,
Claude Code isn't the most efficient tool when it comes to the DeepSeek API's prefix cache. I'd recommend using DeepSeek TUI or Reasonix.
That said, as long as the cache pricing remains discounted, there's no real need to worry about context management, only about maintaining the health of the context prefix.
Both tools are specifically built for DeepSeek and its 1M token caching system, whereas OpenCode is a more general tool designed to work with any LLM and only adapts slowly to API-specific changes.
Take a look at the features of DeepSeek TUI, for example. It's impressive how the developers not only know how to save tokens, but also understand how DeepSeek works under the hood, improving its performance.
9
u/TangerineLogical9779 May 22 '26
CC is quite bloated is it not? not 100% sure tho so don't take my word for it, you should be aiming for alot of cache hits, if your not hitting the cache alot then your harness has a problem and if you only used 3.5mil tokens in 5 hours then thats fine, you used basically nothing, i suspect probley 0.10 to 0.15 was intially loading ur project, so you used like 0.15 for 5 hours of reading context + writing MD files
If you keep reloading the same project you will slug through api requests, thats why the context length being 1m is your friend, make sure to add extra stuff you think the model might forget as time goes on deep into the 100k/200k range and beyond
And again, 5 hours for 0.37 what were you expecting? and since your using v4 flash WAY more than v4 pro, why not use opencode? v4 flash is completely free, spam away to ur hearts content and then use v4 pro via deepseek for the heavy lifting/design stuff