SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA / RankWire.AI / – Nvidia has finalized a binding agreement to purchase Hugging Face in a transaction valued at approximately $12.93 billion. The agreement was signed on September 2, 2026. Nvidia will issue about $11.9 billion to Hugging Face’s shareholders, subject to typical adjustments. Additionally, the deal includes up to roughly $1 billion in equity-based retention grants for eligible employees. Nvidia anticipates completing the acquisition in the first half of 2027, subject to necessary approvals and closing conditions.
Hugging Face is known for running a popular platform dedicated to artificial intelligence models, datasets, applications, and developer tools. Nvidia states that more than 18 million developers, researchers, and creators utilize this platform. It hosts over 3 million AI models and approximately 500,000 datasets, supporting more than 1 million applications. The platform is utilized by over 200,000 companies for tasks such as model discovery, testing, customization, and deployment across diverse computing environments.
Hugging Face will continue to support developers working with various models, frameworks, cloud providers, and computing platforms. Nvidia has emphasized that its hardware will not be mandatory for using the service. The platform will persist in hosting open-source and open-weight models contributed by numerous developers and organizations. Support for multiple clouds and accelerator technologies will remain accessible. Nvidia has also pledged to maintain compatibility with silicon products from companies other than Nvidia once the transaction is finalized.
Open platform access will persist across different hardware options
Hugging Face was founded in 2016 by Clément Delangue, Julien Chaumond, and Thomas Wolf. Since then, the company expanded from developing software tools into hosting models, datasets, applications, and offering cloud-based AI development services. During an August 2023 funding round, Hugging Face achieved a valuation of $4.5 billion after raising $235 million. Nvidia’s relationship with Hugging Face predates the acquisition agreement, with previous collaborations involving projects that linked Hugging Face users to Nvidia computing resources and software.
The acquisition was disclosed by Nvidia through a Form 8-K filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on September 3, 2026. The filing confirms the deal is still pending and specifies conditions that need to be fulfilled before closing, including regulatory approvals and customary closing provisions. Nvidia also outlined post-closing commitments, which include ongoing support for models and datasets, multi-cloud capabilities, and hardware support for accelerator products from other semiconductor manufacturers.
Regulatory approval is required for the completion of the deal
Nvidia already distributes extensive AI resources via the Hugging Face platform, claiming to have published over 500 models and more than 250 open datasets. The company also offers software libraries and development tools that users can adapt for their projects. Hugging Face supports a wide range of entities—companies, researchers, and independent developers—across various stages of AI development, including model discovery, performance evaluation, customization, and deployment of AI applications.
Until all conditions are met and approvals granted, the Nvidia acquisition of Hugging Face will remain incomplete. Nvidia projects that the $12.93 billion deal will close during the first half of 2027. Under the terms of the commitments announced, Hugging Face will continue to support multiple clouds, frameworks, inference services, and computing platforms. Developers will maintain access to hardware choices beyond Nvidia’s products. Until the transaction is finalized, Nvidia and Hugging Face will operate as independent entities under the existing agreement.