diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index b3d72ea5f..70b7c98b5 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -17,6 +17,9 @@
   *note*: SAM3 is a [gated model](https://vladmandic.github.io/sdnext-docs/Gated/)  
 - **Server**
   - update handlers for all authenticated workflows
+  - nunchaku-lite support for `torch==2.13`
+- **Fixes**
+  - init hf env variables before gradio load
 
 ## Update for 2026-08-07
 
diff --git a/installer.py b/installer.py
index f90945bcd..595510e2b 100644
--- a/installer.py
+++ b/installer.py
@@ -1416,6 +1416,14 @@ def set_environment():
     os.environ.setdefault('UV_INDEX_STRATEGY', 'unsafe-any-match')
     os.environ.setdefault('UV_NO_BUILD_ISOLATION', '1')
     os.environ.setdefault('UVICORN_TIMEOUT_KEEP_ALIVE', '60')
+    # duplicate here since hf_init cannot be called before loader
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_EXPERIMENTAL_WARNING', '1')
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_IMPLICIT_TOKEN', '1')
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_SYMLINKS_WARNING', '1')
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_TELEMETRY', '1')
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_VERBOSITY', 'warning')
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DOWNLOAD_TIMEOUT', '60')
+    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_ETAG_TIMEOUT', '10')
     allocator = f'garbage_collection_threshold:{opts.get("torch_gc_threshold", 80)/100:0.2f},max_split_size_mb:512'
     if opts.get("torch_malloc", "native") == 'cudaMallocAsync':
         allocator += ',backend:cudaMallocAsync'
diff --git a/modules/models_hf.py b/modules/models_hf.py
index 2fc084829..f6d311b8c 100644
--- a/modules/models_hf.py
+++ b/modules/models_hf.py
@@ -7,7 +7,6 @@ from modules.shared import opts
 
 # initialize huggingface environment
 def hf_init():
-    os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_EXPERIMENTAL_WARNING', '1')
     os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_EXPERIMENTAL_WARNING', '1')
     os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_IMPLICIT_TOKEN', '1')
     os.environ.setdefault('HF_HUB_DISABLE_SYMLINKS_WARNING', '1')
diff --git a/webui.py b/webui.py
index 2b39c7720..df48a9d52 100644
--- a/webui.py
+++ b/webui.py
@@ -77,6 +77,9 @@ def initialize():
     log.debug('Initializing: modules')
     from concurrent.futures import ThreadPoolExecutor, as_completed
 
+    from modules.models_hf import hf_init
+    hf_init()
+
     modules.sd_checkpoint.init_metadata()
     modules.hashes.load_cache()
 
@@ -135,8 +138,6 @@ def initialize():
     modules.extra_networks.register_default_extra_networks()
     timer.startup.record("networks")
 
-    from modules.models_hf import hf_init
-    hf_init()
     if shared.cmd_opts.test:
         from modules.models_hf import hf_check_cache
         hf_check_cache()