diff --git a/flair/embeddings/token.py b/flair/embeddings/token.py
index e64ee6d18d..ed2038e324 100644
--- a/flair/embeddings/token.py
+++ b/flair/embeddings/token.py
@@ -9,7 +9,6 @@
 import numpy as np
 import torch
 from deprecated.sphinx import deprecated
-from sentencepiece import SentencePieceProcessor
 from torch import nn
 
 import flair
@@ -1389,6 +1388,7 @@ def __init__(
             cache_dir = flair.cache_root / "embeddings"
 
         if model_file_path is not None and embedding_file_path is None:
+            (SentencePieceProcessor,) = lazy_import("word-embeddings", "sentencepiece", "SentencePieceProcessor")
             self.spm = SentencePieceProcessor()
             self.spm.Load(str(model_file_path))
             vectors = np.zeros((self.spm.vocab_size() + 1, dim))