diff --git a/applications/DeepSpeed-Chat/training/utils/utils.py b/applications/DeepSpeed-Chat/training/utils/utils.py
index 56adc5d38..b5cfb8d6d 100644
--- a/applications/DeepSpeed-Chat/training/utils/utils.py
+++ b/applications/DeepSpeed-Chat/training/utils/utils.py
@@ -69,7 +69,8 @@ def load_hf_tokenizer(model_name_or_path, fast_tokenizer=True):
         model_json = os.path.join(model_name_or_path, "config.json")
         if os.path.exists(model_json):
             model_json_file = json.load(open(model_json))
-            model_name = model_json_file["_name_or_path"]
+            model_name = model_json_file.get("_name_or_path",
+                                             model_name_or_path)
             tokenizer = get_tokenizer(model_name,
                                       fast_tokenizer=fast_tokenizer)
     else: