How to Install `transformers` in Python

v5.5.3 Machine Learning & AI Python >=3.10.0 Apache 2.0 License

Transformers: the model-definition framework for state-of-the-art machine learning models in text, vision, audio, and multimodal models, for both inference and training.

Install pip install transformers

What is transformers?

Transformers: the model-definition framework for state-of-the-art machine learning models in text, vision, audio, and multimodal models, for both inference and training.

State-of-the-art pretrained models for inference and training

Transformers acts as the model-definition framework for state-of-the-art machine learning with text, computer vision, audio, video, and multimodal models, for both inference and training.

Documentation → PyPI page → Author: The Hugging Face team (past and future) with the help of all our contributors (https://github.com/huggingface/transformers/graphs/contributors)

Quick Start

Minimal example to get started with transformers:

from transformers import pipeline

# Sentiment analysis
classifier = pipeline("sentiment-analysis")
result = classifier("I love this library!")
print(result)  # [{'label': 'POSITIVE', 'score': 0.9998}]

Installation

pip (standard)

pip install transformers

Virtual environment (recommended)

python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate   # Windows: venv\Scripts\activate
pip install transformers

pip3

pip3 install transformers

conda

conda install -c conda-forge transformers

Poetry

poetry add transformers

Dependencies

Installing transformers will also install these packages:

huggingface-hub numpy packaging pyyaml regex tokenizers typer safetensors tqdm

Verify the Installation

After installing, confirm the package is available:

python -c "import transformers; print(transformers.__version__)"

If this prints a version number, installation succeeded. If you see a ModuleNotFoundError, see the errors section below.

Installation Errors

Common errors when installing transformers with pip.

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'transformers'

Cause: The package is not installed in the current Python environment.

Fix: Run pip install transformers. If using a virtual environment, ensure it is activated first.

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'transformers' (installed but still failing)

Cause: pip installed the package into a different Python than the one running your script.

Fix: Use python -m pip install transformers to install into the interpreter you are running.

ImportError: cannot import name 'X' from 'transformers'

Cause: The function or class does not exist in the installed version.

Fix: Check the version with pip show transformers and upgrade with pip install --upgrade transformers.

pip: command not found

Cause: pip is not in PATH or Python was not added to PATH during installation.

Fix: Try python -m pip install transformers. On macOS/Linux try pip3.

PermissionError: [Errno 13] Permission denied

Cause: No write access to the system Python package directory.

Fix: Use a virtual environment, or add --user: pip install --user transformers

SSL: CERTIFICATE_VERIFY_FAILED

Cause: pip cannot verify PyPI's SSL certificate — common behind corporate proxies.

Fix: Try: pip install --trusted-host pypi.org --trusted-host files.pythonhosted.org transformers

RuntimeError: CUDA out of memory

Cause: Model or batch size exceeds GPU memory.

Fix: Reduce batch size, call torch.cuda.empty_cache(), or run on CPU.

Recent Releases

Version	Released
`5.5.1`	2026-04-09
`5.5.2`	2026-04-09
`5.5.3` latest	2026-04-09
`5.5.0`	2026-04-02
`5.4.0`	2026-03-27

Full release history on PyPI →

Manage transformers

Upgrade to latest version

pip install --upgrade transformers

Install a specific version

pip install transformers==5.5.3

Uninstall

pip uninstall transformers

Check what is installed

pip show transformers

Last updated: 2026-04-11 • Data from PyPI

How to Install transformers in Python