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Hugging Face vs IBM Watson Studio comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 4, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Hugging Face
Ranking in AI Development Platforms
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM Watson Studio
Ranking in AI Development Platforms
17th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Data Science Platforms (18th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the AI Development Platforms category, the mindshare of Hugging Face is 7.9%, down from 12.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Watson Studio is 1.5%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
AI Development Platforms Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Hugging Face7.9%
IBM Watson Studio1.5%
Other90.6%
AI Development Platforms
 

Featured Reviews

SwaminathanSubramanian - PeerSpot reviewer
Director/Enterprise Solutions Architect, Technology Advisor at Kyndryl
Versatility empowers AI concept development despite the multi-GPU challenge
Regarding scalability, I'm finding the multi-GPU aspect of it challenging. Training the model is another hurdle, although I'm only getting into that aspect currently. Organizations are apprehensive about investing in multi-GPU setups. Additionally, data cleanup is a challenge that needs to be resolved, as data must be mature and pristine.
AA
Director, Channel and Alliances at Akinon
Automated processes improve efficiency while user interface and accessibility need enhancements
IBM Watson Studio, while powerful, lacks user-friendliness. It is not easy to use, particularly for medium or small enterprises or less experienced staff. Another aspect that requires improvement is the complexity involved in computer vision tasks. The integration capabilities have not significantly impacted workflow since there are simpler tools like Alteryx and Nine. The platform is associated with a complicated setup process and demands heavy hardware, making it expensive to scale. IBM should work on optimizing the user interface and enhancing the product's accessibility for medium and small enterprises.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The solution is easy to use compared to other frameworks like PyTorch and TensorFlow."
"Overall, the platform is excellent."
"The tool's most valuable feature is that it's open-source and has hundreds of packages already available. This makes it quite helpful for creating our LLMs."
"The most valuable features are the inference APIs as it takes me a long time to run inferences on my local machine."
"The product is reliable."
"Hugging Face provides open-source models, making it the best open-source and reliable solution."
"I appreciate the versatility and the fact that it has generalized many models."
"I would rate this product nine out of ten."
"It has a lot of data connectors, which is extremely helpful."
"Stability-wise, it is a great tool."
"IBM Watson Studio has positively impacted my organization by increasing work efficiency, as it is an end-to-end ML pipeline in one place."
"The system's ability to take a look at data, segment it and then use that data very differently."
"Watson Studio is the most complete tool for AI projects."
"Watson Studio is very stable."
"The most important thing is that it's a multi-faceted solution. It's a kind of specialist, not a generalist. It can produce very specific information for the customer. It's totally different from Google or any search engine that produces generic information. It's specialty is that it's all on video."
"The scalability of IBM Watson Studio is great."
 

Cons

"I've worked on three projects using Hugging Face, and only once did we encounter a problem with the code. We had to use another open-source embedding from OpenAI to resolve it. Our team has three members: me, my colleague, and a team leader. We looked at the problem and resolved it."
"The area that needs improvement would be the organization of the materials. It could be clearer and more systematic. It would be good if the layout was clear and we could search the models easily."
"I believe Hugging Face has some room for improvement. There are some security issues. They provide code, but API tokens aren't indicated. Also, the documentation for particular models could use more explanation. But I think these things are improving daily. The main change I'd like to see is making the deployment of inference endpoints more customizable for users."
"Regarding scalability, I'm finding the multi-GPU aspect of it challenging. Training the model is another hurdle, although I'm only getting into that aspect currently."
"Hugging Face could improve by implementing a search engine or chat bot feature similar to ChatGPT."
"Most people upload their pre-trained models on Hugging Face, but more details should be added about the models."
"Regarding scalability, I'm finding the multi-GPU aspect of it challenging."
"The initial setup can be rated as a seven out of ten due to occasional issues during model deployment, which might require adjustments."
"Better documentation and more tutorials could enhance user experience with IBM Watson Studio."
"It's sometimes easy to get lost given the number of images the solution opens up when you click on the mouse and the amount of different tabs."
"IBM Watson Studio, while powerful, lacks user-friendliness. It is not easy to use, particularly for medium or small enterprises or less experienced staff."
"The initial setup was complex."
"More features in data virtualization would be helpful. The solution could use an interactive dashboard that could make exploration easier."
"We would like to see it less as one big, massive product, but more based on smaller services that we can then roll out to consumers."
"I think maybe the support is an area where it lacks."
"One area that could be improved is the backup and restoration of the database and the overall database configuration."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We do not have to pay for the product."
"The tool is open-source. The cost depends on what task you're doing. If you're using a large language model with around 12 million parameters, it will cost more. On average, Hugging Face is open source so you can download models to your local machine for free. For deployment, you can use any cloud service."
"So, it's requires expensive machines to open services or open LLM models."
"The solution is open source."
"I recall seeing a fee of nine dollars, and there's also an enterprise option priced at twenty dollars per month."
"Hugging Face is an open-source solution."
"The pricing is generally reasonable and straightforward but can vary significantly depending on the specific workloads in use."
"Watson Studio's pricing is reasonable for what you get."
"IBM Watson Studio is an expensive solution."
"IBM Watson Studio is a reasonably priced product"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
University
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Educational Organization
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Hugging Face?
Everything is pretty much sorted in Hugging Face, but it could be improved if there was an AI chatbot or an AI assistant in Hugging Face platform itself, which can guide you through the whole platf...
What is your primary use case for Hugging Face?
My main use case for Hugging Face is to download open-source models and train on a local machine. We use Hugging Face Transformers for simple and fast integration in our applications and AI-based a...
What advice do you have for others considering Hugging Face?
We have seen improved productivity and time saved from using Hugging Face; for a task that would have taken six hours, it saved us five hours, and we completed it in one hour with the plug-and-play...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Watson Studio?
IBM Watson Studio is considered rather expensive, with a rating of six or seven. The pricing could be optimized relative to the features and capabilities of the product.
What needs improvement with IBM Watson Studio?
I think IBM Watson Studio can be improved. I wish learning IBM Watson Studio could be easier and more gradual, as it is a complex task. Also, I think pricing is a bit high.
What is your primary use case for IBM Watson Studio?
My main use case for IBM Watson Studio is the end-to-end ML life cycle. A specific example of a project where I used IBM Watson Studio for the end-to-end machine learning life cycle is that I built...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Watson Studio, IBM Data Science Experience, Data Science Experience, DSx
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
GroupM, Accenture, Fifth Third Bank
Find out what your peers are saying about Hugging Face vs. IBM Watson Studio and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.