diff --git a/common/speculative.cpp b/common/speculative.cpp
index 854a97b85a..2db381d580 100644
--- a/common/speculative.cpp
+++ b/common/speculative.cpp
@@ -2467,7 +2467,10 @@ common_params common_base_params_to_speculative(const common_params & params) {
     result.pooling_type = LLAMA_POOLING_TYPE_UNSPECIFIED;
 
     if (has_draft) {
-        result.devices               = params_spec.devices;
+        // default to global devices value
+        if (!params_spec.devices.empty()) {
+            result.devices           = params_spec.devices;
+        }
         result.model                 = params_spec.mparams;
         result.n_gpu_layers          = params_spec.n_gpu_layers;
         result.tensor_buft_overrides = params_spec.tensor_buft_overrides;