DeepSeek V4.1

Size
552B + 196B Engram
Published
DeepSeek · Sep 2026
Line
New parts in the block · after DeepSeek-V3.2-Exp
Source

deepseek‑ai/DeepSeek‑V4.1‑Flash @ 2cba9e4 · parameter count checked against the checkpoint’s tensor headers · text model onlyHow to read

Sparse attention

40 layers › 6 layers › 5 reusing layers › Compressed sparse attention › Sparse attention

Window keys and values

×

tensorkv

The ring’s 128 slots: the window keys and values of up to the last 128 positions.

shape
WW [B batch, 128 window slots, 512 d_h]
Sources

Contextual evidence from Window ring

The window keys and values: one projection and a norm, the rotary part rotated, quantised to FP8, written to the ring buffer.

attention-window · deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash / inference/model.py
Pinned revision 2cba9e42aa02 ↗ · lines 700–720

Read code excerpt
    def _window_kv(self, x, freqs_cis, start_pos):
        """This layer's sliding-window K and the window positions every query may attend to. The K
        stays fp8, quantized over the whole post-RoPE vector, RoPE tail included."""
        bsz, seqlen, _ = x.size()
        win = self.window_size
        kv = self.kv_norm(self.wkv(x))
        apply_rotary_emb(kv[..., -self.rope_head_dim :], freqs_cis)
        act_quant(kv, fp8_block_size, scale_fmt, scale_dtype, True)
        if start_pos == 0:  # prefill: attend over this chunk, seeding the ring buffer for decode
            if seqlen <= win:
                self.window_kv_cache[:bsz, :seqlen] = kv
            else:
                cutoff = seqlen % win
                self.window_kv_cache[:bsz, cutoff:win], self.window_kv_cache[:bsz, :cutoff] = kv[:, -win:].split(
                    [win - cutoff, cutoff], dim=1
                )
            window_kv = kv
        else:  # decode: one token into the ring buffer, attend over the whole window
            self.window_kv_cache[:bsz, start_pos % win] = kv.squeeze(1)
            window_kv = self.window_kv_cache[:bsz]
        return window_kv, get_window_topk_idxs(win, bsz, seqlen, start_pos)

Contextual evidence from Window ring

The positions a query may attend to inside the sliding window: in a prefill the last 128 up to itself, in a decode step the whole ring.

window-indices · deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash / inference/model.py
Pinned revision 2cba9e42aa02 ↗ · lines 410–426

Read code excerpt
def get_window_topk_idxs(window_size: int, bsz: int, seqlen: int, start_pos: int):
    """Which sliding-window cache slots each query attends to; -1 marks a slot holding nothing.

    The cache is a ring of `window_size` slots. Prefill needs one row per query, each seeing its own
    causal window. A decode step has a single query that sees the whole ring, listed oldest first.
    Order within a row does not matter to `sparse_attn`, which handles every slot independently.
    """
    if start_pos == 0:
        end = torch.arange(seqlen).unsqueeze(1)
        idxs = (end - window_size + 1).clamp(0) + torch.arange(min(seqlen, window_size))
        idxs = torch.where(idxs > end, -1, idxs)  # before the sequence started
    else:
        oldest = start_pos % window_size + 1
        idxs = torch.cat([torch.arange(oldest, window_size), torch.arange(oldest)])
        idxs = torch.where(idxs > start_pos, -1, idxs)  # ring still filling
    # sparse_attn needs real [b, m, topk] int32 memory, hence the materializing expand
    return idxs.int().unsqueeze(0).expand(bsz, -1, -1).contiguous()

Contextual evidence from Window ring

Attention owns a low-rank query, one key–value projection, a learned sink per head, a grouped low-rank output, a ring buffer for the window, and, by the two source lists, a compressor and an indexer; layers that attend to compressed positions use the larger rotary base with YaRN.

attention-init · deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash / inference/model.py
Pinned revision 2cba9e42aa02 ↗ · lines 613–698

Read code excerpt
class Attention(nn.Module):
    """Latent attention over two KV sources at once, concatenated into one `sparse_attn` call: a
    sliding window of raw KV, plus -- when compress_ratio > 0 -- `index_topk` compressed positions
    reaching further back. Q and the output projection are both low-rank, the latter grouped.

    compress_ratio > 0 does not mean the layer compresses its own KV: only kv_source_layers do,
    the rest read that same cache.
    """

    def __init__(self, layer_id: int, args: ModelArgs):
        super().__init__()
        self.layer_id = layer_id
        self.dim = args.dim
        self.n_heads = args.n_heads
        self.n_local_heads = args.n_heads // world_size
        self.q_lora_rank = args.q_lora_rank
        self.o_lora_rank = args.o_lora_rank
        self.head_dim = args.head_dim
        self.rope_head_dim = args.rope_head_dim
        self.nope_head_dim = args.head_dim - args.rope_head_dim
        self.n_groups = args.o_groups
        self.n_local_groups = self.n_groups // world_size
        self.window_size = args.window_size
        self.compress_ratio = args.compress_ratios[layer_id]
        self.eps = args.norm_eps

        self.attn_sink = nn.Parameter(torch.empty(self.n_local_heads, dtype=torch.float32))
        self.wq_a = Linear(self.dim, self.q_lora_rank)
        self.q_norm = RMSNorm(self.q_lora_rank, self.eps)
        self.wq_b = ColumnParallelLinear(self.q_lora_rank, self.n_heads * self.head_dim)
        self.wkv = Linear(self.dim, self.head_dim)
        self.kv_norm = RMSNorm(self.head_dim, self.eps)
        self.wo_a = ColumnParallelLinear(
            self.n_heads * self.head_dim // self.n_groups,
            self.n_groups * args.o_lora_rank,
            dtype=torch.bfloat16,
        )
        self.wo_b = RowParallelLinear(self.n_groups * args.o_lora_rank, self.dim)
        self.softmax_scale = self.head_dim**-0.5

        is_backbone = layer_id < args.n_layers
        self.is_kv_source = is_backbone and layer_id in args.kv_source_layers
        self.is_index_source = is_backbone and layer_id in args.index_source_layers
        self.compressor: Compressor | None = None
        self.indexer: Indexer | None = None
        if self.is_kv_source:
            self.compressor = Compressor(args, layer_id)
        if self.is_index_source:
            self.indexer = Indexer(args, layer_id)

        self.window_kv_cache: torch.Tensor
        self.register_buffer(
            "window_kv_cache",
            torch.zeros(args.max_batch_size, args.window_size, self.head_dim),
            persistent=False,
        )
        if self.is_kv_source:
            self.compress_kv_cache: torch.Tensor
            self.register_buffer(
                "compress_kv_cache",
                torch.zeros(
                    args.max_batch_size,
                    args.max_seq_len // self.compress_ratio,
                    self.head_dim,
                ),
                persistent=False,
            )
        if self.compress_ratio:
            original_seq_len, rope_theta = (
                args.original_seq_len,
                args.compress_rope_theta,
            )
        else:
            # disable YaRN and use base rope_theta in pure sliding-window attention
            original_seq_len, rope_theta = 0, args.rope_theta
        freqs_cis = precompute_freqs_cis(
            self.rope_head_dim,
            args.max_seq_len,
            original_seq_len,
            rope_theta,
            args.rope_factor,
            args.beta_fast,
            args.beta_slow,
        )
        self.freqs_cis: torch.Tensor
        self.register_buffer("freqs_cis", freqs_cis, persistent=False)

Contextual evidence from Join rows

Queries through the latent with their rotary part rotated; window and compressed keys and values joined; sparse attention over the listed positions; the output rotated back, projected per group of heads and then to the model width.

attention-forward · deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash / inference/model.py
Pinned revision 2cba9e42aa02 ↗ · lines 765–789

Read code excerpt
    def forward(self, x: torch.Tensor, start_pos: int):
        bsz, seqlen, _ = x.size()
        freqs_cis = self.freqs_cis[start_pos : start_pos + seqlen]
        rd = self.rope_head_dim

        qr = self.q_norm(self.wq_a(x))
        q = self.wq_b(qr).unflatten(-1, (self.n_local_heads, self.head_dim))
        apply_rotary_emb(q[..., -rd:], freqs_cis)

        kv, topk_idxs = self._window_kv(x, freqs_cis, start_pos)
        if self.compress_ratio:
            compress_kv, compress_idxs = self._compress_kv(x, qr, start_pos, kv.size(1))
            kv = torch.cat([kv, compress_kv], dim=1)
            topk_idxs = torch.cat([topk_idxs, compress_idxs], dim=-1)

        o = sparse_attn(q, kv, self.attn_sink, topk_idxs, self.softmax_scale)
        apply_rotary_emb(o[..., -rd:], freqs_cis, True)

        # wo_a is block-diagonal over groups (each projects only its own heads), hence einsum not
        # Linear. convert.py dequantizes it to bf16; an fp8 grouped GEMM would halve the memory.
        o = o.view(bsz, seqlen, self.n_local_groups, -1)
        wo_a = self.wo_a.weight.view(self.n_local_groups, self.o_lora_rank, -1)
        o = torch.einsum("bsgd,grd->bsgr", o, wo_a)
        x = self.wo_b(o.flatten(2))
        return x