Each dot is a landmark release from one of seven labs; height is that model's LMArena Elo score (a crowdsourced human-preference rating — one of the most widely cited "which model is strongest" benchmarks) at the closest available reading to release. Colored dashed lines mark the two "DeepSeek‑moment" shocks — open‑weight Chinese models closing the gap with top U.S. systems. The gray dashed line is the frontier trend — a linear fit through the highest‑scoring model at each point in time.
