Get the latest tech news

Alibaba's ZeroSearch Teaches AI To Search Without Search Engines, Cuts Training Costs By 88%


Alibaba Group researchers have developed "ZeroSearch," a technique that enables large language models to acquire search capabilities without using external search engines during training. The approach transforms LLMs into retrieval modules through supervised fine-tuning and employs a "curriculum-bas...

The approach transforms LLMs into retrieval modules through supervised fine-tuning and employs a "curriculum-based rollout strategy" that gradually degrades generated document quality.In tests across seven question-answering datasets, ZeroSearch matched or exceeded the performance[PDF] of models trained with real search engines. A 7B-parameter retrieval module achieved results comparable to Google Search, while a 14B-parameter version outperformed it. Researchers have released their code, datasets, and pre-trained models on GitHub and Hugging Face, potentially lowering barriers to entry for smaller AI companies developing sophisticated assistants.

Get the Android app

Or read this on Slashdot

Read more on:

Photo of Alibaba

Alibaba

Photo of search engines

search engines

Photo of training costs

training costs

Related news:

News photo

Alibaba’s ‘ZeroSearch’ lets AI learn to google itself — slashing training costs by 88 percent

News photo

Alphabet shares sink after Apple’s Cue says AI will replace search engines

News photo

Alibaba launches open source Qwen3 model that surpasses OpenAI o1 and DeepSeek R1