A "big fish" at year-end?
A rumor that China's DeepSeek will release a large model at the end of the year spread on X on Oct. 25 (the night of the same day, Japan time). A person who said they had visited DeepSeek hinted that a "big fish" was coming from the company. @LeroyLi311063, an account that posts on Chinese AI developments, also reported it, citing the words "End of the year." The X user @Jo1uck posted a roundup of these.
It is not clear what the "big fish" refers to. It is also unknown whether it is a large new-generation model or a larger version of an existing model. The source is posts by individuals, and DeepSeek has not announced anything. ORIENS has not been able to confirm that the visit took place.
A string of V4.1 releases in October
DeepSeek released a series of "V4.1" models in October. In mid-October, it updated the lightweight "V4.1 Flash," and the existence of the higher-end "V4.1 Pro" came to light from a configuration file. It also released "DeepInfer," software that speeds up inference.
Rumors about the company's new models have repeatedly circulated before release, and the timing has often been wrong. In August 2025, the company denied a report that it would release its next model that month.
