diff --git a/mmengine/dist/utils.py b/mmengine/dist/utils.py
index e0cf8c1171..285c0f371b 100644
--- a/mmengine/dist/utils.py
+++ b/mmengine/dist/utils.py
@@ -94,6 +94,15 @@ def _init_dist_mpi(backend, **kwargs) -> None:
             'nccl', 'gloo' and 'mpi'. Defaults to 'nccl'.
         **kwargs: keyword arguments are passed to ``init_process_group``.
     """
+    if backend == 'smddp':
+        try:
+            import smdistributed.dataparallel.torch.torch_smddp  # noqa: F401
+        except ModuleNotFoundError as e:
+            raise ModuleNotFoundError(
+                'Please use an Amazon SageMaker DLC to access smdistributed: '
+                'https://github.com/aws/deep-learning-containers/blob/master'
+                '/available_images.md#sagemaker-framework-containers'
+                '-sm-support-only') from e
     local_rank = int(os.environ['OMPI_COMM_WORLD_LOCAL_RANK'])
     torch.cuda.set_device(local_rank)
     if 'MASTER_PORT' not in os.environ:
@@ -433,6 +442,8 @@ def get_comm_device(group: Optional[ProcessGroup] = None) -> torch.device:
     elif backend == 'cncl':
         import torch_mlu  # noqa: F401
         return torch.device('mlu', torch.mlu.current_device())
+    elif backend == 'smddp':
+        return torch.device('cuda', torch.cuda.current_device())
     else:
         # GLOO and MPI backends use cpu device by default
         return torch.device('cpu')