Mac Studio M5 Max vs API Costs: $10k Buys 100B Tokens on DeepSeek Flash
AndreVallestero · reddit · 2026-08-25
A Reddit user analyzed the cost-effectiveness of a $10k Mac Studio M5 Max versus API inference. The same budget buys only 6.2B tokens on Qwen Pro or 5.7B on DeepSeek V4 Pro, but jumps to 100B tokens on DeepSeek V4 Flash. The author argues that unless data sovereignty requires local inference, it's more cost-effective to use mid-range local cards for standard models and offload hard tasks to cloud APIs.
Related event: Debate: $10K Mac Studio vs Monthly AI API Subscriptions(2 posts)→
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