Abstract Measurements of Higgs boson production, where the Higgs boson decays into a pair of $$\uptau $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>τ</mml:mi> </mml:math> leptons, are presented, using a sample of proton-proton collisions collected with the CMS experiment at a center-of-mass energy of "Equation missing"<!-- image only, no MathML or LaTex -->, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 $$\,\text {fb}^{-1}$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mspace /> <mml:msup> <mml:mtext>fb</mml:mtext> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>-</mml:mo> <mml:mn>1</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> . Three analyses are presented. Two are targeting Higgs boson production via gluon fusion and vector boson fusion: a neural network based analysis and an analysis based on an event categorization optimized on the ratio of signal over background events. These are complemented by an analysis targeting vector boson associated Higgs boson production. Results are presented in the form of signal strengths relative to the standard model predictions and products of cross sections and branching fraction to $$\uptau $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>τ</mml:mi> </mml:math> leptons, in up to 16 different kinematic regions. For the simultaneous measurements of the neural network based analysis and the analysis targeting vector boson associated Higgs boson production signal strengths are found to be $$0.82\pm 0.11$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>0.82</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.11</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> for inclusive Higgs boson production, $$0.67\pm 0.19$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>0.67</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.19</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> ( $$0.81\pm 0.17$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>0.81</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.17</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> ) for the production mainly via gluon fusion (vector boson fusion), and $$1.79\pm 0.45$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>1.79</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.45</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> for vector boson associated Higgs boson production.