DeepSeek is indeed preparing to launch V4, its next flagship AI model, with an expected release in mid-February 2026—strategically timed around the Chinese Lunar New Year (February 17th)[1][3][5]. This follows DeepSeek's established tradition of making major announcements during the Spring Festival period[6].
What to Expect from V4
Programming Excellence: V4 is specifically designed to excel at coding and programming tasks[1]. Internal testing suggests the model can compete with leading systems from OpenAI and Anthropic in this area, though these performance claims remain unverified by independent benchmarks[1].
Advanced Coding Features: Based on reports, V4 is expected to offer several technical improvements:
- Superior bug fixing with higher success rates in autonomously resolving GitHub issues
- Contextual code completion that predicts entire function blocks rather than just single lines
- Refactoring capability that understands how code changes ripple across multiple files[3]
- Extended context handling with an optimized "infinite" context window, addressing the "lost in the middle" issues some users experienced with V3.2[3]
Long-Context Processing: The model is optimized to handle extremely long coding prompts and complex, multi-file architectures—a direct response to developer pain points with current solutions[4].
Competitive Pricing: DeepSeek is expected to maintain its aggressive pricing strategy, with API costs likely remaining significantly lower than US-based competitors[4].
Why the Timing?
The February release coincides with DeepSeek's pattern of strategic announcements. Recent activity supports the rumors: on January 4th, 2026, DeepSeek significantly updated its R1 research paper on arXiv, expanding it from 22 to 86 pages with detailed training pipelines and benchmark data[6]. Last year, both V3 and R1 were released during the Spring Festival window, suggesting this could be another "New Year's goods" tradition[6].
Important Caveats
All performance claims currently rest on internal testing and have not been independently verified[1]. Official release dates, feature specifications, and public availability details remain unconfirmed[3]. DeepSeek has historically deployed variants and experimental branches before broader public releases, so timing should be treated as provisional until an official announcement[3].
Sources
- https://www.igorslab.de/en/deepseek-prepares-new-cutting-edge-ai-model-with-a-focus-on-programming/
- https://devops.com/deepseek-to-unfurl-ai-model-with-enhanced-coding-capabilities-in-february-report/
- https://www.cometapi.com/deepseek-v4-rumored-to-launch-during-spring-festival/
- https://www.remio.ai/post/deepseek-v4-coding-model-launches-feb-2026-features-api-costs-and-developer-expectations
- https://help.apiyi.com/en/deepseek-v4-release-coding-ai-model-en.html
- https://eu.36kr.com/en/p/3631908557374473
- https://mcc-covid.crc.pitt.edu/COVID19_official_websites/Mozambique/moh_situation_reports/2020-05-10_08031589112229.html?y-news-26505146-2026-01-12-spain-announces-upcoming-launch-of-deepseek-v4-focused-on-enhancing-coding-capabilities
