Gradio 5 is here: Hugging Face’s newest tool simplifies building AI-powered web apps

Hugging Face, the fast-growing AI startup valued at about $4.5 billion, has launched Gradio 5, a major update to its popular open-source tool for creating machine learning applications. The new version aims to make AI development more accessible, potentially speeding up enterprise adoption of machine learning technologies.

Gradio, which Hugging Face acquired in 2021, has quickly become a cornerstone of the company’s offerings. With over 2 million monthly users and more than 470,000 applications built on the platform, Gradio has emerged as a key player in the AI development ecosystem.

Bridging the gap: Python proficiency meets web development ease

The latest version aims to bridge the gap between machine learning expertise and web development skills. “Machine learning developers are very comfortable programming in Python, and oftentimes, less so with the nuts and bolts of web development,” explained Abubakar Abid, Founder of Gradio, in an exclusive interview with VentureBeat. “Gradio lets developers build performant, scalable apps that follow best practices in security and accessibility, all in just a few lines of Python.”

One of the most notable features of Gradio 5 is its focus on enterprise-grade security. Abid highlighted this aspect, telling VentureBeat, “We hired Trail of Bits, a well-known cybersecurity company, to do an independent audit of Gradio, and included fixes for all the issues that they found in Gradio 5… For Gradio developers, the key benefit is that your Gradio 5 apps will, out-of-the-box, follow best practices in web security, even if you are not an expert in web security yourself.”

AI-assisted app creation: Enhancing development with natural language prompts

The release also introduces an experimental AI Playground, allowing developers to generate and preview Gradio apps using natural language prompts. Ahsen Khaliq, ML Growth Lead at Gradio, emphasized the importance of this feature, saying, “Similar to other AI coding environments, you can enter a text prompt explaining what kind of app you want to build and an LLM will turn it into Gradio code. But unlike other coding environments, you can also see an instant preview of your Gradio app and run it in the browser.”

This innovation could dramatically reduce the time and expertise needed to create functional AI applications, potentially making AI development more accessible to a wider range of businesses and developers.

Gradio’s position in the AI ecosystem is becoming increasingly central. “Once a model is available on a hub like the Hugging Face Hub or downloaded locally, developers can wrap it into a web app using Gradio in a few lines of code,” Khaliq explained. This flexibility has led to Gradio being used in notable projects like Chatbot Arena, Open NotebookLM, and Stable Diffusion.

Future-proofing enterprise AI: Gradio’s roadmap for innovation

The launch of Gradio 5 comes at a time when enterprise adoption of AI is accelerating. By simplifying the process of creating production-ready AI applications, Hugging Face is positioning itself to capture a significant share of this growing market.

Looking ahead, Abid hinted at ambitious plans for Gradio: “Many of the changes we’ve made in Gradio 5 are designed to enable new functionality that we will be shipping in the coming weeks… Stay tuned for: multi-page Gradio apps, navbars and sidebars, support for running Gradio apps on mobile using PWA and potentially native app support, more built-in components to support new modalities that are emerging around images and video, and much more.”

As AI continues to impact various industries, tools like Gradio 5 that connect advanced technology with practical business applications are likely to play a vital role. With this release, Hugging Face is not just updating a product — it’s potentially altering the landscape of enterprise AI development.