DeepSeek not working in Russia: what to check and how to keep working

"DeepSeek is not working in Russia" is a query covering at least four different situations: the chat site will not open, the chat opens but does not answer, a program gets an error from the API, or the API is silent and requests hang until a timeout. Each has a different fix. Below is a sequence of checks from the simplest to the rarest and a fallback so work does not stop. A caveat first: we do not know what is happening on your network and will not guess at causes. We show how to find out.

Step 1. What exactly is not working

Identify which part is failing, because the following steps differ.

Step 2. Check whether the service itself is down

If the official chat site will not open, check from another device and another network (for example, from a phone on mobile data). If it works there, the problem is in your network or with your access provider. If it fails everywhere, an outage or overload is possible: look at the service's status page, if there is one, and its official channels. Overload on popular services passes by itself, but how soon is not known in advance.

We do not claim the cause is any particular blocking: the data available to us does not show that. What matters is something else: if your work depends on a model, a single way of access creates downtime risk, and a backup is useful.

Step 3. If the error is in a program: decode the code

For requests through the Zukko gateway the codes are:

• 401: wrong key. Check the fetch_ prefix and stray spaces or quotes in the environment variable.
• 402: not enough balance. Top up in the dashboard.
• 403 model_not_allowed_for_key: the key has a restricted model list (allowed_models).
• 404 model_not_found: no such model name. Compare with GET /v1/models.
• 429: the key's daily or monthly limit is exhausted (key_daily_limit_reached, key_monthly_limit_reached) or a restriction at the model's provider.
• 503: the provider is unavailable or the model is disabled (model_disabled).

If you work with the official DeepSeek API directly, check its list of codes in the documentation: there, for example, 402 means the balance ran out, 429 means request rate or concurrency limits were exceeded, and 503 means the server is overloaded. More on common connection errors: 401, 402, model not found↗.

Step 4. Diagnosis from the terminal

One time-limited request shows where the break is. Put in your own key:

curl -sS -m 30 -o /dev/null -w "HTTP %{http_code}, total %{time_total}s\n" \
  https://api.zukko.pro/v1/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $ZUKKO_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"model":"deepseek-v4.1-flash","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"ping"}],"max_tokens":5}'

How to read the output:

• HTTP 200: the gateway and model respond, so the problem is in your program or its settings;
• HTTP 401/402/403/404: see the decoding above;
• HTTP 503: the model or its provider is unavailable, switch to another (step 6);
• curl: (28) Operation timed out: the request did not arrive or the reply did not return in 30 seconds: check your internet connection and retry;
• curl: (6): the host name does not resolve: check DNS and network settings.

If your editor (Cursor, Cline, Claude Code) shows an error while curl passes, the cause is in the client settings: most often a wrong base URL. For OpenAI-compatible clients it must be https://api.zukko.pro/v1; details in Base URL with or without /v1↗.

Step 5. Timeouts on long answers

Models with long reasoning may take a long time to answer, and the connection sits idle without data and is dropped by an intermediate node. Turn on streaming (stream: true): data flows in pieces and the connection stays alive. How to set up a client for long answers is covered in timeouts of long generations↗.

Step 6. Fallback: the same DeepSeek models through a gateway

If the official service is unavailable to you and you need to work, DeepSeek models can be called through the Zukko gateway. Zukko is available from Russia: the balance is topped up by SBP, MasterCard or cryptocurrency. Three models on October 18, 2026 (prices per 1M tokens):

Steps:

1. Create a key on the API keys↗ page and top up the balance from $1. SBP is paid in rubles at the market rate at the time of payment, and the payment page adds an 8.5% fee on top; MasterCard cards carry a fee of about 13% (amounts $2 to $594); crypto payment is available.
2. In your code set base_url="https://api.zukko.pro/v1" and the model deepseek-v4.1-flash; the rest of your OpenAI SDK code stays the same.
3. Test with the curl command from step 4.

For reliability, add a chain of fallback models to your code. If one is unavailable or disabled (503), the request goes to the next:

import os
from openai import OpenAI, APIConnectionError, APIStatusError

client = OpenAI(
    base_url="https://api.zukko.pro/v1",
    api_key=os.environ["ZUKKO_API_KEY"],
    timeout=60,
    max_retries=0,
)
CHAIN = ["deepseek-v4.1-flash", "deepseek-v4-flash", "glm-5.3-flash"]

def ask(prompt: str):
    last = None
    for model in CHAIN:

Note that a 429 caused by an exhausted key limit hits every model in the chain equally, so this is not a way around the limit but protection against an outage at one provider. More on retries and fallback models: error handling: retry, 429, 503↗. Which model to pick for a task is decided by testing on your data.

A two-minute checklist

1. Does the site open from another device and another network?
2. Which code is in the error: 401, 402, 403, 404, 429 or 503?
3. Does curl with a 30-second timeout pass?
4. Is the base URL right (with /v1 for OpenAI-compatible clients)?
5. Is there a fallback model in the code?

FAQ

Is DeepSeek blocked in Russia?

We cannot confirm that from the data we have and do not guess at causes: the chat may fail to open because of the network, overload or an outage. Check from another network and by the steps above. Practically, it matters more to have a backup way to call models.

How do models through a gateway differ from the DeepSeek chat?

The chat is a ready interface, the gateway is an API: you call models from code or a tool and pay per token, and you organize the conversation history, limits and interface yourself.

The API returns 503. What now?

The model's provider is unavailable or the model is disabled. Take another model from GET /v1/models and repeat the request. If the response carries the model_disabled code, that model is switched off and retrying it is pointless.

How do I start using the fallback?

Create a key in the dashboard, top up the balance and run the curl from step 4: if HTTP 200 returns, the connection works.