Google Gemini 4 Release Date Might Not Be Far Away, DeepMind Chief Drops Major Hint

Google appears to be getting much closer to its next major AI model. The company’s new DeepMind chief, Koray Kavukcuoglu, has revealed that Gemini 4 is already in the early stages of post-training, with Google aiming to release it “much earlier” than the end of 2026.

Gemini 4 release date might be near, and Google knows it has a lot to catch up with

Kavukcuoglu made the comments during his first media appearance as the new leader of Google DeepMind at The Information’s AI Agenda Live Summit. He said Google wants to get an early post-training version out as soon as possible because the team is already seeing promising results, before continuing with rapid iterations.

That does not give us an exact Gemini 4 release date, but it does make one thing clear. Google is not planning to wait until the final weeks of the year before putting its next flagship model in users’ hands. To put things into perspective, Google hasn’t launched another flagship model since the Gemini 3 series in November 2025, while OpenAI and Anthropic have continued pushing their latest models.

And Google now has plenty to catch up with. SpaceXAI recently launched Grok 4.7, pitching it as a stronger model for coding and knowledge work with improved reasoning, self-verification, and a longer context. Anthropic followed with Claude Opus 5.5, while OpenAI also introduced GPT-6 Sol and GPT-6 Luna.

Source: The Information