SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA / RankWire.AI / – Nvidia has reached an agreement to acquire Hugging Face for $12.93 billion in a definitive deal unveiled on Thursday. The signing took place on September 2, 2026, with Nvidia set to pay approximately $11.9 billion to Hugging Face’s shareholders, subject to certain adjustments. The transaction also encompasses up to about $1 billion in equity-based retention awards designated for employees joining Nvidia. The deal is projected to finalize in the first half of 2027, contingent upon the approval of relevant regulatory authorities.
Hugging Face operates a highly popular platform for creating, sharing, and deploying AI models, datasets, and applications. Nvidia reports that over 18 million developers, researchers, and creators leverage the platform. Hugging Face hosts more than 3 million models, 500,000 datasets, and 1 million applications. Its services are utilized by more than 200,000 companies to discover, evaluate, customize, and implement AI systems. The platform has established itself as a central hub for open-source and open-weight AI development.
Nvidia emphasized that Hugging Face will continue to support developers working with various models, frameworks, cloud providers, and computing platforms. Nvidia hardware will not be mandatory for building or deploying projects on Hugging Face. The platform will uphold its support for open-source and open-weight models from diverse developers. Nvidia also assured that Hugging Face will sustain compatibility with multiple cloud services and accelerator platforms, including ongoing access for developers utilizing hardware from other semiconductor firms.
Agreement safeguards Hugging Face’s open platform
Founded in 2016 by French entrepreneurs Clément Delangue, Julien Chaumond, and Thomas Wolf, Hugging Face has developed software libraries alongside its model and dataset hosting offerings. During its last disclosed funding round in August 2023, the company was valued at $4.5 billion, raising $235 million from technology investors. Prior to the acquisition, Nvidia and Hugging Face collaborated on projects that enabled developers to access Nvidia’s computing infrastructure through familiar Hugging Face tools.
Nvidia revealed the definitive agreement in a Form 8-K filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on September 3. This filing confirms that the acquisition has not yet been finalized. Completion depends on customary closing conditions and the approval of regulatory agencies. Nvidia also reaffirmed its commitment to keeping Hugging Face’s platform open according to existing practices, allowing users to upload and download select models and datasets, as well as supporting vendors other than Nvidia.
Approval processes are still ongoing before closing
Nvidia has already established a significant presence on the Hugging Face platform through its open AI initiatives, publishing over 500 models and more than 250 open datasets. The company also provides libraries and tools for developers to modify and expand upon. Hugging Face offers infrastructure for researchers, companies, and independent developers working with AI, including model hosting, datasets, software tools, and cloud-based resources for building and deploying AI applications.
The $12.93 billion Nvidia Hugging Face acquisition remains pending until all closing conditions are satisfied. Nvidia states that Hugging Face will continue supporting models from the broader AI ecosystem post-acquisition. Developers will maintain their flexibility regarding models, frameworks, cloud services, inference providers, and computing platforms under the commitments made. The platform will also uphold multi-cloud and multi-accelerator development and deployment. Nvidia anticipates the deal to close during the first half of 2027, subject to the necessary regulatory approvals.
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