diff --git a/llmfoundry/data/finetuning/tasks.py b/llmfoundry/data/finetuning/tasks.py
index f2bd0239c8..edbfcc28c7 100644
--- a/llmfoundry/data/finetuning/tasks.py
+++ b/llmfoundry/data/finetuning/tasks.py
@@ -339,14 +339,20 @@ def dataset_mapper(example: Dict):
                 example = preprocessing_fn(example)
             return _tokenize_formatted_example(example, tokenizer)
 
+        detected_cpu_count = os.cpu_count() or 1
+        num_cpus_to_use = max(1, detected_cpu_count - 4)
+
         columns_to_remove = list(dataset[0].keys())
         tokenized_dataset = dataset.map(
             dataset_mapper,
             batched=False,
             remove_columns=columns_to_remove,
+            num_proc=num_cpus_to_use,
         )
         prompt_length_filtered_dataset = tokenized_dataset.filter(
-            lambda example: len(example['input_ids']) < max_seq_len)
+            lambda example: len(example['input_ids']) < max_seq_len,
+            num_proc=num_cpus_to_use,
+        )
 
         examples_removed = len(tokenized_dataset) - len(
             prompt_length_filtered_dataset)
diff --git a/tests/test_hf_conversion_script.py b/tests/test_hf_conversion_script.py
index d2f203d3a0..d2c2a9e1c9 100644
--- a/tests/test_hf_conversion_script.py
+++ b/tests/test_hf_conversion_script.py
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 import os
 import pathlib
 import sys
-from unittest.mock import MagicMock
+from unittest.mock import MagicMock, patch
 
 from composer import Trainer
 from composer.loggers import MLFlowLogger
@@ -254,6 +254,7 @@ def test_callback_inits_with_defaults():
 @pytest.mark.parametrize(
     'hf_save_interval,save_interval,max_duration,expected_hf_checkpoints,expected_normal_checkpoints',
     [('3ba', '2ba', '7ba', 3, 4), ('1dur', '2ba', '1ep', 1, 4)])
+@patch('os.cpu_count', MagicMock(return_value=None))
 def test_huggingface_conversion_callback(model: str, tmp_path: pathlib.Path,
                                          fsdp_state_dict_type: Optional[str],
                                          log_to_mlflow: bool,