diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 5b8bdf3..b4c16e1 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -19,6 +19,7 @@ A dedicated section for constructing and deploying data pipelines and workflows
 Before you begin, ensure you have met the following requirements:
 
 - **Snowflake Account**: Ensure you have an active Snowflake account in a region where Cortex functionalities are supported. For detailed information, refer to the [Availability Region documentation](https://docs.snowflake.com/en/user-guide/snowflake-cortex/llm-functions#availability).
+- **Private Preview Access**: To try private preview models in Snowflake, you need to contact your Snowflake account team to request access to the private preview feature.
 - **Role Permissions**: ACCOUNTADMIN or equivalent role with permissions to create:
   - Stages
   - Databases
diff --git a/src/build.py b/src/build.py
index 5322c11..ec33e9b 100644
--- a/src/build.py
+++ b/src/build.py
@@ -104,7 +104,10 @@ def get_functionality_settings(functionality, config):
     defaults = config["default_settings"]
 
     if functionality == "Complete":
-        settings['model'] = st.selectbox("Change chatbot model:", defaults['model'])
+        is_private_preview_model_shown = st.checkbox("Show private preview models", value=False)
+        settings['model'] = st.selectbox("Change chatbot model:", defaults[
+                "private_preview_models" if is_private_preview_model_shown else "model"
+            ])
         settings['temperature'] = st.slider("Temperature:", defaults['temperature_min'], defaults['temperature_max'], defaults['temperature'])
         settings['max_tokens'] = st.slider("Max Tokens:", defaults['max_tokens_min'], defaults['max_tokens_max'], defaults['max_tokens'])
         settings['guardrails'] = st.checkbox("Enable Guardrails", value=defaults['guardrails'])
diff --git a/src/playground.py b/src/playground.py
index c73b7b7..038cab3 100644
--- a/src/playground.py
+++ b/src/playground.py
@@ -64,7 +64,10 @@ def get_functionality_settings(functionality, config):
     defaults = config["default_settings"]
 
     if functionality == "Complete":
-        settings['model'] = st.selectbox("Change chatbot model:", defaults['model'])
+        is_private_preview_model_shown = st.checkbox("Show private preview models", value=False)
+        settings['model'] = st.selectbox("Change chatbot model:", defaults[
+                "private_preview_models" if is_private_preview_model_shown else "model"
+            ])
         settings['temperature'] = st.slider("Temperature:", defaults['temperature_min'], defaults['temperature_max'], defaults['temperature'])
         settings['max_tokens'] = st.slider("Max Tokens:", defaults['max_tokens_min'], defaults['max_tokens_max'], defaults['max_tokens'])
         settings['guardrails'] = st.checkbox("Enable Guardrails", value=defaults['guardrails'])
diff --git a/src/rag.py b/src/rag.py
index d0bb9eb..8096c59 100644
--- a/src/rag.py
+++ b/src/rag.py
@@ -12,6 +12,9 @@
 with open(config_path, "r") as f:
     config = json.load(f)
 
+settings = {}
+defaults = config["default_settings"]
+
 def display_rag(session):
     """
     Displays the Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) interface in Streamlit.
@@ -134,9 +137,12 @@ def display_rag(session):
                     selected_column = st.selectbox("Select Column", ["Vector_Embeddings"])
         #st.subheader("Select Model, Embedding Type and Emdedding Model")
         st.info("Use the same embedding type and model consistently when creating embeddings.")
+        is_private_preview_model_shown = st.checkbox("Show private preview models", value=False)
         col1,col2,col3 =  st.columns(3)
         with col1:
-            selected_model = st.selectbox("Select Model", config["default_settings"]["model"])
+            selected_model = st.selectbox("Select Model", config["default_settings"][
+                "private_preview_models" if is_private_preview_model_shown else "model"
+            ])
         with col2:
             embedding_type = st.selectbox("Select Embeddings", config["default_settings"]["embeddings"].keys())
         with col3:
diff --git a/src/settings_config.json b/src/settings_config.json
index ee03ed7..2d232c7 100644
--- a/src/settings_config.json
+++ b/src/settings_config.json
@@ -19,6 +19,7 @@
       "mixtral-8x7b", "reka-core", "reka-flash", "snowflake-arctic"
   ],
     "fine_tune_models" : ["llama3-8b","llama3-70b","llama3.1-8b","llama3.1-70b","mistral-7b","mixtral-8x7b"],
+    "private_preview_models": ["deepseek-r1"],
     "temperature_min": 0.0,
     "temperature_max": 1.0,
     "temperature": 0.7,