TL;DR: NVIDIA has agreed to acquire Hugging Face for $12.93 billion, with closing planned for the first half of 2027 pending regulatory approvals.

Chipmaker NVIDIA entered a definitive agreement to purchase AI developer platform Hugging Face, announcing the transaction on September 3, 2026. According to the Associated Press, the headline value is about $13 billion, while company filings break that total into approximately $11.9 billion payable to stockholders and up to about $1 billion in equity-based retention for employees joining NVIDIA.

The announcement marks one of the largest software acquisitions in artificial intelligence to date and centers on open models, shared datasets and collaborative development tools. According to Reuters, NVIDIA Chief Executive Jensen Huang said Hugging Face would stay an open platform and would not require users to run on NVIDIA chips.

The deal is not yet complete. NVIDIA said in a regulatory filing that closing is expected in the first half of 2027, subject to customary closing conditions including required regulatory approvals. That future closing date means integration, expanded infrastructure support and other post-closing plans remain pending until those conditions are satisfied.

What was announced and when

NVIDIA said the earliest event behind the filing occurred on September 2, 2026, when it entered the definitive agreement to acquire Hugging Face, Inc. The company disclosed the agreement in a Form 8-K filed September 3, 2026.

According to the filing, Hugging Face operates a platform and community for developing, sharing and deploying open-source models, datasets and applications. The filing describes the buyer as NVIDIA Corporation of Santa Clara, California, and identifies the transaction as an acquisition of Hugging Face, Inc.

The September 3 announcement was published through multiple channels on the same day, including an NVIDIA blog post authored by Huang, coverage by the Associated Press, and coverage by Reuters. The AP report, updated at 12:10 p.m. CDT on September 3, described NVIDIA as a chipmaker whose processors are integral to AI and identified the target as artificial intelligence software platform Hugging Face.

Reports of a possible transaction had circulated before the formal announcement. According to MarketWatch, reports last week had indicated the deal was imminent or even complete, meaning it was widely anticipated among investors.

How the $12.93 billion breaks down

NVIDIA disclosed a total figure of $12,930,300,000 in its company blog. The securities filing provides the components behind the rounded $13 billion headline used in news reports.

Approximately $11.9 billion represents purchase price payable to Hugging Face stockholders, subject to certain adjustments. Up to approximately $1.0 billion represents an equity-based retention program for Hugging Face employees joining NVIDIA.

According to Reuters, the structure includes about $11.9 billion to investors and an equity-based retention program of up to $1 billion for employees joining NVIDIA. Axios similarly reported that NVIDIA will pay up to $1 billion in employee retention bonuses in addition to the purchase price.

Hugging Face had previously raised around $400 million in venture funding, according to Axios, most recently at a $4.5 billion valuation in 2023. MarketWatch also reported the 2023 private-market valuation at $4.5 billion, indicating the agreed acquisition price is nearly three times that earlier valuation.

Axios listed backers as Lux Capital, Addition, Sequoia Capital, Coatue, Menlo Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, Betaworks and NVIDIA itself. Axios also reported that Hugging Face approached NVIDIA about a deal, but had other bidders.

Expected closing timeline

The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2027, according to the Form 8-K. Closing remains subject to satisfaction or waiver of customary closing conditions, including receipt of required regulatory approvals.

NVIDIA described certain post-closing intentions as expectations rather than completed actions. The filing states NVIDIA expects the acquisition to provide additional resources to Hugging Face and support developers building, sharing and deploying open models and applications.

Forward-looking statements in the filing cover proposed timing, anticipated benefits and post-closing plans. The company cautioned that those statements reflect management beliefs and assumptions and available information, and are subject to risks and uncertainties.

How large Hugging Face has become

Hugging Face is based in New York, according to The Wall Street Journal. Its platform functions as a repository where developers share models, datasets and applications.

NVIDIA said more than 18 million developers, researchers and creators use Hugging Face to share more than 3 million models, 500,000 datasets and 1 million applications. More than 200,000 companies use the platform to discover, evaluate, customize and deploy AI, according to the company blog.

Leadership of the startup includes Clem, Julien and Thomas and their team, as identified by Huang in the announcement. MarketWatch identified chief executive Clément Delangue and quoted him telling reporters after the announcement:

“What we’re most excited about is to have even more ability to think long-term”

Delangue said the platform currently serves 18 million AI developers, with a goal of reaching 100 million in the next few years, according to MarketWatch. That target describes a future aspiration, not a completed result.

Open-platform commitments

A central element of the announcement is a pledge to keep Hugging Face open. Huang wrote that Hugging Face will remain an open platform for the entire AI ecosystem.

According to the NVIDIA blog, developers will choose the models they want, the frameworks they want, the clouds and inference service providers they want and the computing platforms they want. The company stated that NVIDIA compute will not be required to build on or deploy through Hugging Face.

The filing uses similar language in regulatory terms. NVIDIA committed to keep the platform open consistent with existing practices, including continuing to permit model makers, developers and users to upload and download models and datasets of their choosing and to support other silicon vendors.

Huang also said Hugging Face will continue to support open-source and open-weight models from every model builder across the ecosystem. The platform will continue to support multi-cloud and multi-accelerator development and deployment, allowing builders to use hardware and infrastructure that fit their work.

Justin Boitano, NVIDIA vice president of enterprise AI, reinforced that message on a call with reporters. According to MarketWatch, Boitano said the chipmaker is “incentivized” and “motivated” to keep Hugging Face open and neutral for developers to run models and access datasets “from any platform in the world that they want to run it on.”

Why NVIDIA links the deal to open weights

NVIDIA framed the acquisition as an expansion of its work with open-weight models, meaning models whose weights are public and can be adapted by users. Axios noted that NVIDIA emphasized that definition in its announcement.

Huang said NVIDIA has supported open-weight models for years through investments and contributions to open-source platforms, including Hugging Face. The company said it has released more than 500 models on Hugging Face and more than 250 open datasets, and described itself as the largest contributor of open models and data to the platform.

The blog states that NVIDIA builds models, libraries and tools in the open so developers can use, modify and build on them. It also says open models, data and tools broaden access to AI.

According to the announcement, open models let startups, businesses, universities and public institutions build on advanced capabilities without training every model from scratch. NVIDIA said matching the right model to the right job can advance safety, strengthen cybersecurity and sovereignty, accelerate innovation and extend AI to factories, hospitals, farms, classrooms and small businesses.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the deal accelerates NVIDIA’s push to promote open-weight AI models and services that challenge proprietary models from large U.S. AI companies as well as open models developed in China.

Market context and analyst reaction

NVIDIA shares rose 1.8% on Thursday, according to MarketWatch, as investors assessed the acquisition.

D.A. Davidson analyst Gil Luria described Hugging Face as “one of the most important parcels of real estate in the AI market,” according to MarketWatch. Luria compared the platform to GitHub, noting Microsoft acquired GitHub in 2018 for a reported $7.5 billion.

Luria added:

“One of the learnings from the GitHub acquisition is that allowing a large integrated platform to acquire an important repository puts everybody else at a disadvantage”

John Belton, portfolio manager at Gabelli Funds, said smaller AI labs and open-source developers could gain from greater access to graphics processing units and inference infrastructure, according to MarketWatch. Inference is the process of running AI models. Belton pointed to shortages caused by surging demand for computing power from large cloud companies and major AI developers such as OpenAI and Anthropic.

Belton also said advances in open-source technology have helped reduce the price of intelligence for end users, according to MarketWatch. Lower costs to train and run models could support more AI applications and faster adoption, which he said would ultimately benefit NVIDIA and other infrastructure providers.

Joe Tigay, portfolio manager at Rational Equity Armor Fund, said ownership of Hugging Face would let NVIDIA compete more directly in software, where models, tools and developers determine hardware use, according to MarketWatch.

Regulatory and policy risks disclosed

The Form 8-K includes a supplemental risk factor concerning government restrictions that could affect both NVIDIA and the Hugging Face platform.

NVIDIA said demand for open-source foundation models and applications based on them promotes worldwide use of its products and sustains the Hugging Face platform. It also said it is committed to promoting training, distribution and use of closed and open-source AI models and applications.

At the same time, the filing warns that other parties are lobbying governments to adopt measures that would restrict or disadvantage open-source models and their customers. Governments may impose new requirements governing development, training, release, distribution, access, transfer, deployment or use of AI models, including open-source models.

Such requirements, according to the filing, could restrict models or datasets available through Hugging Face, require platform or practice changes, delay or restrict offerings, increase compliance costs or lead to investigations or enforcement actions.

The filing also states that many widely used open-source models originated in China and are subsequently downloaded, revised, fine-tuned and tested by developers in the United States and worldwide. Any regulatory control limiting NVIDIA’s ability to provide products and services supporting models derived from any region, including China, could materially affect the Hugging Face platform as well as NVIDIA’s business, operating results and financial condition.

Sources referenced