Alibaba Claims Qwen Family Tops 3 Billion Downloads, Hugging Face Data Shows Lower Figure

Key Points

• Alibaba says Qwen models have surpassed 3 billion downloads, claiming the top spot among open-weight families.
• Hugging Face reports about 2.05 billion Qwen downloads and 151,448 derivatives, roughly a third lower than Alibaba’s claim.
• The discrepancy arises because Hugging Face tracks activity only on its Hub, while Alibaba includes traffic from its ModelScope platform.
• Qwen derivatives still outnumber Meta’s entire open‑model collection by more than two‑to‑one.
• Alibaba has open‑sourced over 460 models and distributes them through its cloud to Southeast Asia and Africa.
• Meta and Nvidia have launched new open models, with Nvidia stating it is competing with China on open weights.
• Beijing may impose curbs on overseas access to its leading models, potentially limiting Qwen’s global reach.