Hugging Face CEO says China leads in AI race and open models

The scoreboard in the global AI race just got an update, and it’s not the one Silicon Valley was hoping for. Chinese-developed open-weight AI models now account for 41% of all downloads on Hugging Face, the world’s largest repository for AI models, compared to 36.5% from US-developed models during the period from February 2025 to February 2026. Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue has been vocal about the trend, pointing to China’s growing dominance in the open model ecosystem. In a prior measurement period ending August 2025, Chinese models held a narrower edge at 17% versus 15.8% for US models. The download numbers tell a clear story Chinese AI labs like Alibaba, with its Qwen series, and Zhipu AI, with its GLM family, have been releasing models that compete with or exceed American counterparts on industry benchmarks. Chinese labs have been attaching permissive licenses to their models, making them easier to deploy commercially without the legal overhead that sometimes accompanies US alternatives. When US models couldn’t respond, a Chinese one did Delangue offered a striking anecdote that underscores why this shift matters beyond download charts. In July 2026, Hugging Face itself fa...