New steel alloying concepts were designed in order to produce a fully ferritic, low‐alloy steel with high (1 GPa) ultimate tensile strength. A simulated hot‐deformation process of the Ti‐Mo‐V‐Nb and Ti‐Mo‐V steels was designed for that purpose, and the strengthening mechanisms of the steels were evaluated after the isothermal dwell at three different temperatures (590 °C, 630 °C, and 680 °C). The tensile strength (TS) and the yield strength (YS) of the test alloys were estimated via hardness measurements. Results showed that the estimated tensile strength (TS) of over 1000 MPa and yield strength (YS) of over 900 MPa could be achieved in both steels, although the contribution of different strengthening mechanisms to the YS varied between the steels. The effect of the dislocation strengthening could especially compensate the reduced effect of the precipitation strengthening at all tested coiling temperatures (CT). Based on the results, a CT range of 590–630 °C with the 1800 s dwell time seemed to be a potential process window for the studied steels after the present TMCP route.This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.