Meta is building AI data centers in tents and isn't slowing down — Zuckerberg reveals plans for 'several multi-GW clusters,' including one called Hyperion that's almost as big as Manhattan

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Move fast and build things.

Inside Meta's data center
(Image credit: Meta)

Meta is accelerating its investment in the infrastructure it believes will be needed to power the future of artificial intelligence training and inference, with a number of high-capacity, fast-deployment data centers. CEO Mark Zuckerberg outlined plans for gigantic, "multi-GW clusters" at truly gargantuan scale, and he's doing it extremely quickly by leveraging a number of cost and time-saving measures inspired by xAI. Meta is also building "tented" data centers, rather than traditionally roofed structures.

Zuckerberg threads.

(Image credit: Meta)

The 1GW "Prometheus" datacenter will come online in 2026, but Meta is also building "Hyperion," he said, which will take a few years to build up to scale and will eventually require as much as 5GW of power. Meta is also working on several other data centers in the longer term, and each of these "titan clusters" could be as large as a sizeable portion of Manhattan.

Zuckerberg threads.

(Image credit: Threads)

The self-styled "Zuck" went on to say that "Meta Superintelligence Labs will have industry-leading levels of compute and by far the greatest compute per researcher," which may hint at the business model Meta is targeting. If it can't build the AI itself, perhaps it could join Amazon and other entities, like Groq, in providing the infrastructure to power it.

That competition will mean Meta needs to scale up fast if it wants to be competitive, and that seems to be exactly what it's doing. Semi-Analysis detailed how Meta has reinvented its datacenter strategy about building them with AI in mind. Meta will reportedly use a new "tent" style of structure that is faster to build and has less redundancy to further increase the pace of deployment. Where traditional data centers have backup diesel generators should they encounter a power outage, the new Meta sites will do away with that entirely.

They will also leverage pre-fabricated power and cooling modules and will draw power from on-site meta substations, with smart workload management tools helping to maximize the power available to each datacenter. That can also include on-site natural gas generation, too, with Meta already building two 200MW natural gas plants in Ohio.

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Jon Martindale
Jon Martindale
Freelance Writer

Jon Martindale is a contributing writer for Tom's Hardware. For the past 20 years, he's been writing about PC components, emerging technologies, and the latest software advances. His deep and broad journalistic experience gives him unique insights into the most exciting technology trends of today and tomorrow.

9 Comments Comment from the forums
  • rluker5
    Building an AI datacenter nearly the size of Manhattan with tent style structures for at least parts of it, other companies using AI GPUs as borrowing collateral to buy more AI GPUs. While some AI datacenters sit idle in China and Amazon not being able to find a better way to make money with AI than to rent out capacity.

    A new gold rush. Other than finding several copies of all of our data, figuring out what we are likely to buy and how to charge us the most for it, replacing some human interaction and data processing jobs, government monitoring, and data security breaches, what is it good for other than FOMO hyped equipment sales?

    I only see a few labor efficiency benefits and mostly downsides otherwise. Not including short term financial gains of course. I wonder how long before there will be more and more laws and restrictions to keep the general populace from being exploited from those looking to the AI industry to profit from the losses of material wealth, IP, privacy, freedom, and security of the general population?
    Reply
  • Flemkopf
    So, they're planning to put billions of dollars of equipment powered by a gigawatt substation...under a tent? With one of those datacenters being put in a state that had over seventy tornadoes last year, plus flooding, and they're putting in a minimum of redundancy?

    I saw the remains of a twenty acre agricultural greenhouse that got shredded by a tornado a few years ago. Tomatoes and peppers are a heck of a lot cheaper to replace than GPU servers. Heck, for that matter what is Zuck planning to do when it rains? Ten square miles of tenting means that you're dealing with 500 acre-feet of water running right through your facility every time you get an inch of rain.

    Then you've got the heat. Every gigawatt averages out to about two square miles of solar exposure in Ohio. That's going to have an impact in a localized area and no, the locals are not going to be happy about you boiling their nearby lake.

    All this for a product that doesn't have a path to profitability, leading to a scrapped data center withing three or four years. But at least they won't have to take down a building when that happens.
    Reply
  • SomeoneElse23
    I have to wonder what the real reason is behind this "AI" hype.

    It's certainly not what they say it is.
    Reply
  • ripbeefbone
    SomeoneElse23 said:
    I have to wonder what the real reason is behind this "AI" hype.

    It's certainly not what they say it is.
    not everything is a secret sinister plot, rich people are just not actually smart and the tech industry is more grift than substance
    Reply
  • EzzyB
    SomeoneElse23 said:
    I have to wonder what the real reason is behind this "AI" hype.

    It's certainly not what they say it is.
    That one is easy. He who controls the AI controls the narrative.

    Don't believe me, do an Google search, what do you see? 3 billion searches a day and all see that AI summary. How many just look at it and take it at face value?

    All you have to do is look at Musk's Grok (who is now programmed to search Musk's posts before formulating a response), and it's quite easy to see that the AI will say whatever it's creator wants it to say.
    He who controls the AI, controls the narrative.
    Reply
  • jackt
    I hope its a joke!
    Reply
  • rluker5
    SomeoneElse23 said:
    I have to wonder what the real reason is behind this "AI" hype.

    It's certainly not what they say it is.
    It doesn't have to be complicated. Like crypto, if you can put some money in and take more out, regardless of the rhyme or reason, making money is enough. And with AI more hype = more money.

    Of course if the end result is people being hurt in one way or another, but you don't care and just want to make money anyways that kind of fits the definition of evil, but you don't want to bring that up because it would put the brakes on this gravy train. Crypto also fits this because it also burns up a lot of the planet's limited resources for no gain other than some making money off of investments, but the harm pretty much ends there for that. AI is worse.
    Reply
  • jp7189
    Remember those pictures of bitcoin mining facilities with bare motherboards and gpus with cables everywhere sitting on cheap shelving from home depot all in a warehouse with the bay doors propped open and fans blowing in fresh air....
    Reply
  • Captain Awesome
    I think Meta has a good idea. If I ever get a 5090 I'm going to setup my computer outside in a tent too, so I won't burn my house down if the cable melts. 😁
    Reply