python · StanFromIreland · Aug 24, 2026 · Aug 22, 2026 · Aug 22, 2026 · Aug 23, 2026
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+---
+title: RISC-V is now officially supported by CPython!
+publishDate: 2026-08-24
+author: Stan Ulbrych
+description: >
+  I’m happy to announce that RISC-V platforms are now officially supported by
+  CPython. 🎉 🚀
+tags: []
+published: true
+---
+Over the last few months, I’ve been working on improving CPython’s support for
+the RISC-V architecture, and I’m thrilled to announce that RISC-V is now
+officially supported by CPython as a [tier 3](https://peps.python.org/pep-0011/#tier-3)
+platform! 🎉 🚀
+
+## What is RISC-V?
+
+![RISC-V logo](RISC-V-logo.svg)
+
+[RISC-V](https://riscv.org/) is an open [instruction set architecture (ISA)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instruction_set_architecture). Importantly,
+unlike proprietary instruction sets (such as x86 and ARM), it is developed as an
+open standard and can be implemented by anyone.
+
+Its ecosystem has grown considerably in recent years and is [projected to
+quadruple by 2032](https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/articles/risc-v-market-projected-quadruple-101200888.html). With that growth, it’s increasingly important that
+Python works reliably on these platforms.
+
+## Getting here
+
+This would not have been possible without community contributions. RISC-V support
+in CPython has developed over time with people testing on real hardware,
+fixing architecture-specific issues, improving build support, reporting bugs,
+and reviewing patches. That work is what has brought the platform to the point
+where it could be added to [PEP 11](https://peps.python.org/pep-0011/).
+
+![RISE project logo](rise.jpg)
+
+A particularly important part of this has been having reliable, ongoing testing
+on real RISC-V hardware. I’d like to thank the [RISE Project](https://riseproject.dev/) for their
+support. RISE has kindly provided several RISC-V machines for CPython,
+giving us buildbots for testing as well as debugging architecture-specific issues.
+
+I’d especially like to thank [Ludovic Henry](https://github.com/luhenry) from the RISE Project,
+[Furkan Onder](https://github.com/furkanonder), and [Emma Smith](https://emmatyping.dev/), along with the many others who have
+contributed. Additionally, I'm personally grateful for the [Sovereign Tech Agency](https://www.sovereign.tech/),
+which through their amazing fellowship supported my work on this.
+
+## What’s next?
+
+While tier 3 support is an important milestone, there’s plenty more to do.
+We are currently investigating how to improve our testing further by bringing
+RISC-V directly into CPython’s CI, again kindly supported by RISE with their
+[RISE RISC-V Runners initiative](https://riscv-runners.riseproject.dev/). This should give contributors faster
+feedback than the [buildbots](https://buildbot.python.org/) (which usually run *after* a patch is merged)
+and would allow us to catch RISC-V-specific problems earlier.
+
+In the long term, I’d also love to work towards promoting RISC-V to tier 2 support.
+
+There are also opportunities to move beyond simply making CPython work on RISC-V.
+I’d like to explore architecture-specific optimizations to take better advantage
+of RISC-V capabilities where doing so can improve CPython’s performance.
+
+Importantly, we need people to use it and give us feedback. If you have access
+to RISC-V hardware, please try building and running CPython, run your workloads
+and test suites, and please [let us know what breaks](https://github.com/python/cpython/issues). Testing across
+different RISC-V environments will help us make support better for everyone!
+
+CPython is also only one part of the Python ecosystem. Continued community work
+across packages, compilers, tooling, and infrastructure will be important in
+making RISC-V an increasingly well-supported platform for Python as a whole.
+
+There’s a lot still to do, and I’m looking forward to continuing that work!
diff --git a/content/posts/riscv-now-officially-supported/rise.jpg b/content/posts/riscv-now-officially-supported/rise.jpg