NVIDIA Officially Acquires Hugging Face for $12.93 Billion
On September 3, NVIDIA announced on its official blog a definitive agreement to acquire Hugging Face for approximately $12.93 billion (exactly $12,930,300,000). Jensen Huang personally announced the deal, and Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue said he initiated it by contacting Huang this summer. Per shared deal documents, about $11.9 billion goes to shareholders with up to $1 billion in employee retention equity, with closing expected in H1 2027 pending regulatory approval. The deal marks a direct acquisition of core open-source AI infrastructure by a compute giant, and gives the ten-year-old 'GitHub of AI' a new home.
Confirmed
- Jensen Huang announced the acquisition on the NVIDIA blog, pledging to expand the Hugging Face platform, strengthen infrastructure, and broaden AI access for developers and institutions worldwide; he emphasized that open models enhance security and cyber safety, accelerate innovation, and support technological sovereignty (m1, m5, m10, m16)
- Hugging Face co-founder Thom Wolf confirmed the deal and noted an Easter egg in the price: 129303 is the Unicode code point of the hug emoji U+1F917 (m7, m12, m15)
- CEO Clément Delangue said on CNBC that he personally reached out to Jensen Huang this summer; his statement argued open-source AI has reached an inflection point, with the community proving open models can complement or even replace closed APIs (m4, m12, m17, m18)
- The Verge senior editor Tom Warren reported the price is nearly triple (2.9x) Hugging Face's $4.5 billion 2023 valuation; the company was founded in 2016 (m11)
- Deal documents show $11.9 billion to shareholders plus up to $1 billion in employee retention equity, closing expected in H1 2027 after regulatory approval (m20)
- Hugging Face serves 18M+ developers/researchers, hosts 3M+ models, and is used by 200,000 enterprises (m5, m9, m11, m20)
- Both parties committed to open, neutral, platform-agnostic AI; Michael Dell and Google also confirmed continued support and cooperation (m8, m9, m10, m20)
- Huang said in a video that open models are very important to NVIDIA (m2, m3), while an investor account relayed his pragmatic advice to use closed models when capabilities iterate quickly—NVIDIA internally uses Claude (m14)
Unconfirmed
- The deal remains subject to regulatory approval; the H1 2027 timeline and retention equity details rest on deal documents and media reports
Why it matters
- Hugging Face is the 'GitHub of AI' and the core hub for open model and dataset distribution; the acquisition reshapes open-source AI distribution and infrastructure (m11)
- Community reactions are polarized: some see a boon for open models, others worry the 'Switzerland of AI' losing neutrality to a chip giant (m2, m4)
- Analysts note strong complementarity and aligned incentives: NVIDIA wins when countless developers train, fine-tune, and run models, making this potentially one of the best outcomes for open-source AI (m14, m20)
- The deal is also read as a landmark bet on the US open-source AI ecosystem against closed models (m17)
2026-09-03 ~ 2026-09-04 · 93 related posts
- Episode 1: NVIDIA Reportedly Agrees to Buy Hugging Face for ~$12.9B(2026-08-27, 60 posts)
- Episode 2: NVIDIA Partners with Hugging Face on Nemotron Open Models(2026-08-27, 3 posts)
- Episode 3: Nvidia Reportedly Eyes $13 Billion Hugging Face Acquisition(2026-08-28, 3 posts)
- Episode 4: NVIDIA Reportedly Agrees to Acquire Hugging Face for $12.9B(2026-08-30, 8 posts)
- Episode 5: Nvidia Reportedly Agrees to Buy Hugging Face for Around $12.9 Billion(2026-08-31, 7 posts)
- Episode 6: NVIDIA Officially Acquires Hugging Face for $12.93 Billion(2026-09-03, 93 posts)
- Episode 7: Rumored NVIDIA Acquisition of Hugging Face at $12.93B Hides 🤗 Easter Egg(2026-09-03, 8 posts)
- Episode 8: Data Shows Open-Weight Models Are Widely Deployed in Production(2026-09-03, 2 posts)
- Episode 9: Nvidia to Acquire Hugging Face for $12.93 Billion in Landmark Open-Source AI Deal(2026-09-04, 14 posts)
- Episode 10: Nvidia Confirms $12.93 Billion Acquisition of Hugging Face, Betting Big on Open-Source AI(2026-09-04, 5 posts)
- Episode 11: NVIDIA Reportedly to Acquire Hugging Face for $12.9 Billion(2026-09-07, 5 posts)
- Episode 12: Rumored Nvidia acquisition of Hugging Face sparks debate(2026-09-09, 2 posts)
Primary sources
- Nvidia's $12.9B Hugging Face Deal: Why 1+1 Will Likely Equal 1.2 — DavidLinthicum · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia nearing $12.9B Hugging Face acquisition — 86x its ~$150M revenue run rate — rohanpaul_ai · 2026-09-03
- Reported $14B NVIDIA bid for Hugging Face prices it at 93x its $150M ARR — thedealdirector · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia reportedly nearing $14B Hugging Face acquisition; Kevin Durant's $250K bet up ~260x — 创业邦 · 2026-09-03
- NVIDIA to Acquire Hugging Face for $12.93B, Pledging Platform Stays Open — vanstriendaniel · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia to acquire Hugging Face for about $12.93 billion — xiaohu · 2026-09-03
- Hugging Face co-founder confirms Nvidia acquisition with $12.93B easter egg — Thom_Wolf · 2026-09-03
- Why NVIDIA-Hugging Face deal may be the best outcome for open-source AI — Thom_Wolf · 2026-09-03
- Hugging Face cofounder reflects on 2016 origins as NVIDIA deal lands — deliprao · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia acquires Hugging Face to fuel a scaled American open-source AI ecosystem — Borthwick · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia to acquire Hugging Face for $12.9 billion — SarcasticBaka · 2026-09-03
- Hugging Face confirms major NVIDIA deal, early investor congratulates the team — graceisford · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia reportedly acquiring Hugging Face for $12.93B, unverified — Polymarket · 2026-09-03
- Nathan Lambert's Call for NVIDIA to Buy Hugging Face Aged Perfectly — menhguin · 2026-09-03
- Hugging Face Co-founder Thom Wolf Reflects on the Journey to NVIDIA's $12.93B Deal — helloiamleonie · 2026-09-03
- Betaworks partner on Hugging Face's Nvidia deal: the best possible outcome for open American AI — Borthwick · 2026-09-03
- NVIDIA becomes home for Hugging Face as Jensen Huang doubles down on open models — pcuenq · 2026-09-03
- Nvidia to buy Hugging Face in $12.9bn deal, betting on open AI models — nordicinst · 2026-09-03
- Podcast claims NVIDIA buying Hugging Face for $12.9B, traces its open-source rise — TheTuringPost · 2026-09-03
- NVIDIA partners with Hugging Face to scale the open AI platform — NVIDIAAI · 2026-09-03
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