DeepSeek has officially retired the legacy API aliases deepseek-chat and deepseek-reasoner as of July 24, 2026, at 15:59 UTC. This move, which was announced earlier, forces developers to migrate to the new model strings or face broken integrations.
While many guides focus solely on renaming the model string, the real story is that per-token pricing has changed. The retirement comes with verified rate deltas that could affect your monthly bill. Developers are advised to review the new rate card and adjust their cost projections accordingly.
To ease the transition, DeepSeek has provided a migration checklist and worked examples. The company also introduced peak/off-peak surge pricing (UTC+8) with the V4 General Availability, which adds another layer of complexity to cost management.
For a full breakdown of the changes, including the exact rate differences and step-by-step migration instructions, refer to the official DeepSeek blog and the maintained pricing page.