A low-cost DeepSeek V4 Flash and Kimi CLI coding setup
was tested across several to find the best result for the lowest API cost. OpenClaw, OpenClaude, and OpenCode did not feel good enough, although OpenClaude produced decent results with API costs that were too high. Claude Code was used as the main benchmark, and it handled a company order-control and monthly-cost prompt very well on the first try.
Codex with GPT 5.5 performed poorly on Excel-related work. Kimi CLI, using the simple model, produced results close to Claude while costing much less. Claude was then used to design a more general harness for Kimi CLI, avoiding hardcoded behavior where possible.
After testing, the setup reached Claude-like results on several tasks involving logic and numbers, and it may become the main working setup after more testing.
Key points
- was tested through several .
- Claude Code handled the business order and monthly cost task very well on the first attempt.
- Codex with GPT 5.5 was weak on Excel-related work in this test.
- Kimi CLI produced Claude-like results with much lower API cost.
- A custom harness for Kimi CLI improved results on logic and number-heavy tasks.