diff --git a/launcher/src/main.rs b/launcher/src/main.rs
index 96ad18f9..1865cf90 100644
--- a/launcher/src/main.rs
+++ b/launcher/src/main.rs
@@ -115,13 +115,11 @@ fn main() -> ExitCode {
                     None => {
                         // try to default to the number of available GPUs
                         tracing::info!("Parsing num_shard from CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES");
-                        let cuda_visible_devices = env::var("CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES")
+                        let n_devices = num_cuda_devices()
                             .expect("--num-shard and CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES are not set");
-                        let n_devices = cuda_visible_devices.split(",").count();
                         if n_devices <= 1 {
                             panic!("`sharded` is true but only found {n_devices} CUDA devices");
                         }
-                        tracing::info!("Sharding on {n_devices} found CUDA devices");
                         n_devices
                     }
                     Some(num_shard) => {
@@ -144,9 +142,19 @@ fn main() -> ExitCode {
             }
         }
     } else {
-        // default to a single shard
-        num_shard.unwrap_or(1)
+        match num_shard {
+            // get num_shard from CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES or default to a single shard
+            None => num_cuda_devices().unwrap_or(1),
+            Some(num_shard) => num_shard,
+        }
     };
+    if num_shard < 1 {
+        panic!("`num_shard` cannot be < 1");
+    }
+
+    if num_shard > 1 {
+        tracing::info!("Sharding model on {num_shard} processes");
+    }
 
     // Signal handler
     let running = Arc::new(AtomicBool::new(true));
@@ -669,3 +677,11 @@ fn shutdown_shards(shutdown: Arc<Mutex<bool>>, shutdown_receiver: &mpsc::Receive
     // This will block till all shutdown_sender are dropped
     let _ = shutdown_receiver.recv();
 }
+
+fn num_cuda_devices() -> Option<usize> {
+    if let Ok(cuda_visible_devices) = env::var("CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES") {
+        let n_devices = cuda_visible_devices.split(',').count();
+        return Some(n_devices);
+    }
+    None
+}