Countries / Asia-Pacific and Middle East
United Arab Emirates
The UAE is building very large AI capacity in Abu Dhabi, helped by a July 2026 US decision to treat it as a trusted destination for advanced chips.
The federal strategy aims to make the UAE a world leader in AI by 2031, with a federal AI Council and an Abu Dhabi AI and Advanced Technology Council. G42, the Abu Dhabi group, welcomed a US Commerce (BIS) decision on 17 July 2026 to place the UAE in Country Group A:5 and approve G42 and Core42 as authorised recipients of advanced computing items; we read only G42's statement, not the BIS notice. The Stargate UAE cluster of 1GW inside a planned 5GW campus is under construction, with the first 200MW targeted for 2026 according to press. For someone seeking compute, capacity is concentrated in Abu Dhabi and tied to G42, Khazna and their US partners; we did not identify a single federal AI law in the sources read, and personal data is governed by the federal data protection law.
AI policy and activity
The UAE Government portal describes a UAE Strategy for AI, a National Programme for AI, a Chief Executive Officer for AI role in federal entities, a UAE Council for AI and, in Abu Dhabi, an AI and Advanced Technology Council that develops financing, investment and digital infrastructure plans.
Power and grid
Primary: EWEC states all four Barakah nuclear units are operating (Unit 4 commercial since September 2024) and feed the national grid. A single data centre newsletter (Global Data Center Hub) reports a national team reviewing data centre impact on the energy sector and quotes the energy minister on 20 to 30 percent transmission loss; we could not verify either from a government source.
Data centres and compute
| Site | Where | Status | Notes and source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stargate UAE (1GW cluster within the 5GW UAE-US AI Campus) Khazna Data Centers (G42), with OpenAI, Oracle, NVIDIA, Cisco and SoftBank | Abu Dhabi | Under construction | Reported. Gulf News (16 October 2025) quotes a G42 spokesperson that the first 200MW is due in 2026 and that the rest of the 1GW and the 5GW campus have no confirmed completion dates. We did not find a source confirming the first phase is live. (source) |
| Khazna Data Centers portfolio Khazna Data Centers (G42) | United Arab Emirates (sites not listed on the page read) | Operating | Primary, marketing claims. Operator says its facilities exceed Tier III standards and hold LEED Gold and Estidama Pearl-4 certifications. No capacity figures or site list were on the page read. (source) |
Rules and programmes
| Instrument | Kind | Status | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|
| UAE Strategy for Artificial Intelligence and UAE Council for AI | Policy | In force | Primary. Government portal says the Council implements the strategy to make the UAE a world leader in AI by 2031. The strategy document itself (ai.gov.ae, uaecabinet.ae) could not be fetched, so adoption date and targets are not confirmed here. |
| Federal Decree Law No. 45 of 2021 on Personal Data Protection | Law | In force | Primary. Government portal summary: covers processing inside or outside the country, sets cross-border transfer requirements, and names the UAE Data Office (Decree Law No. 44 of 2021) as federal regulator. Entry-into-force date not stated on the page read. |
| US BIS decision placing the UAE in Country Group A:5 and approving G42 and Core42 | Policy | In force | Operator statement of 17 July 2026 describing the decision under a US-UAE AI framework. This is a US export-control measure; we did not read the BIS text, so conditions and effective date are unconfirmed. |
Checked on 2 October 2026 and due for review by 1 January 2027. Many sources are trade press or law-firm summaries rather than official texts, and statuses such as reported or unconfirmed are shown as the source gives them. This is a summary, not legal advice. If something is wrong or out of date, tell us.