What is DeepSeek?
DeepSeek AI
DeepSeek is a Chinese AI lab based in Hangzhou and the name of its AI assistant. The lab is known for releasing open-weight models, such as DeepSeek-R1 in January 2025. Its assistant is used widely enough that brands with global audiences track it alongside ChatGPT and Gemini.
DeepSeek is a Hangzhou-based AI lab, backed by the hedge fund High-Flyer, and the assistant of the same name.
Its models are released as open weights, so they also run inside other companies' products.
DeepSeek's Search mode retrieves and links web sources; without it, answers come from training data.
How DeepSeek works
DeepSeek works like other AI assistants: you ask a question in its chat app or website, and its models write an answer. The lab was founded in 2023 by Liang Wenfeng and is backed by High-Flyer, a Chinese hedge fund he co-founded.
DeepSeek answers in two main ways:
From training data: the model's parametric knowledge, which often comes without links to sources.
With Search mode: the assistant browses the web while it answers and shows the pages it used, a form of retrieval-augmented generation.
DeepSeek drew global attention in January 2025, when it released its R1 reasoning model and its assistant app rose above ChatGPT as the most downloaded free app on the US iOS App Store.
Why DeepSeek matters for brand visibility
DeepSeek matters for brand visibility because it reaches users who may never open ChatGPT, and because its models travel far beyond its own app.
Distinct audience: DeepSeek's assistant is popular in markets where other engines have less reach, so it can shape how your brand is seen there.
Open weights: DeepSeek releases model weights under open licenses, including MIT for R1, so other companies can host its models inside their own products.
Different sources: its search results and training data differ from other engines, so its answers about your category can differ too.
The open-weight point cuts both ways. What a DeepSeek model learned about your brand can surface in tools you will never see, and tracking the DeepSeek app only covers part of that reach.
DeepSeek's limits and concerns
DeepSeek comes with limits and concerns you should weigh before investing heavily in it.
Government restrictions: some governments have restricted DeepSeek on official devices, including Australia for government systems and the US for defense and intelligence devices.
Source handling: a 2025 Nieman Lab test found that DeepSeek's Search mode often listed many sources, which could bury the most relevant one.
Training data answers: without search, answers may give no links or outdated facts, which raises the risk of AI hallucination about your brand.
None of this means you should ignore DeepSeek. It means you should track it as one engine among several, weighted by how much your audience uses it.
How to improve how DeepSeek describes your brand
You improve how DeepSeek describes your brand with the same fundamentals that work across AI engines, applied with its audience in mind.
Track it separately: run your prompts in DeepSeek in the countries and languages where you sell.
Publish clear facts: state what you do, who it is for and how you compare, on pages that are easy to crawl and quote.
Cover your key languages: if you sell in markets where DeepSeek is popular, publish in those languages.
Earn broad coverage: independent reviews and media mentions feed both search results and future training data.
Correct errors at the source: when DeepSeek repeats a wrong fact, find and fix the pages it likely came from.
Compare DeepSeek's answers with other engines. Large gaps often point to sources or markets your current work does not reach.
How KIME tracks DeepSeek
KIME tracks DeepSeek as one of ten AI engines, by country and language. Track & Analyze shows how often DeepSeek mentions your brand and your competitors for your tracked prompts, where you are placed in the answer and in what tone. You can filter by engine to compare DeepSeek with ChatGPT, Gemini and others, and spot prompts where DeepSeek describes your category differently.
Frequently asked questions
Is DeepSeek open source?
DeepSeek releases its model weights openly, and several models, including DeepSeek-R1, are published under the MIT license. That lets anyone download, run and adapt the models. The training data is not openly released, so many people describe the models as open-weight rather than fully open source.
Does DeepSeek search the web?
Yes. DeepSeek's assistant has a Search mode that browses the web while it answers and shows the pages it used as sources. With Search mode off, the assistant answers from its training data, often without links. Your website and third-party coverage therefore matter for both modes, in different ways.
Should brands outside China track DeepSeek?
It depends on your audience. DeepSeek's assistant is used internationally, and its open-weight models run inside other products, so brands with global audiences often track it alongside ChatGPT and Gemini. If your buyers rarely use DeepSeek, give it less weight than the engines they rely on, but check it before you rule it out.