
Just as there are widely understood empirical laws of nature - for example, what goes up must come down, or every action has an equal and opposite reaction - the field of AI was long defined by a single idea: that more compute, more training data and more parameters makes a better AI model.
However, AI has since grown to need three distinct laws that describe how applying compute resources in different ways impacts model performance. Together, these AI scaling laws - pretraining scaling, post-training scaling and test-time scaling, also called long thinking - reflect how the field has evolved with techniques to use additional compute in a wide variety of increasingly complex AI use cases.
The recent rise of test-time scaling - applying more compute at inference time to improve accuracy - has enabled AI reasoning models, a new class of large language models (LLMs) that perform multiple inference passes to work through complex problems, while describing the steps required to solve a task. Test-time scaling requires intensive amounts of computational resources to support AI reasoning, which will drive further demand for accelerated computing.
What Is Pretraining Scaling? Pretraining scaling is the original law of AI development. It demonstrated that by increasing training dataset size, model parameter count and computational resources, developers could expect predictable improvements in model intelligence and accuracy.
Each of these three elements - data, model size, compute - is interrelated. Per the pretraining scaling law, outlined in this research paper, when larger models are fed with more data, the overall performance of the models improves. To make this feasible, developers must scale up their compute - creating the need for powerful accelerated computing resources to run those larger training workloads.
This principle of pretraining scaling led to large models that achieved groundbreaking capabilities. It also spurred major innovations in model architecture, including the rise of billion- and trillion-parameter transformer models, mixture of experts models and new distributed training techniques - all demanding significant compute.
And the relevance of the pretraining scaling law continues - as humans continue to produce growing amounts of multimodal data, this trove of text, images, audio, video and sensor information will be used to train powerful future AI models.
Pretraining scaling is the foundational principle of AI development, linking the size of models, datasets and compute to AI gains. Mixture of experts, depicted above, is a popular model architecture for AI training. What Is Post-Training Scaling? Pretraining a large foundation model isn't for everyone - it takes significant investment, skilled experts and datasets. But once an organization pretrains and releases a model, they lower the barrier to AI adoption by enabling others to use their pretrained model as a foundation to adapt for their own applications.
This post-training process drives additional cumulative demand for accelerated computing across enterprises and the broader developer community. Popular open-source models can have hundreds or thousands of derivative models, trained across numerous domains.
Developing this ecosystem of derivative models for a variety of use cases could take around 30x more compute than pretraining the original foundation model.
Developing this ecosystem of derivative models for a variety of use cases could take around 30x more compute than pretraining the original foundation model.
Post-training techniques can further improve a model's specificity and relevance for an organization's desired use case. While pretraining is like sending an AI model to school to learn foundational skills, post-training enhances the model with skills applicable to its intended job. An LLM, for example, could be post-trained to tackle a task like sentiment analysis or translation - or understand the jargon of a specific domain, like healthcare or law.
The post-training scaling law posits that a pretrained model's performance can further improve - in computational efficiency, accuracy or domain specificity - using techniques including fine-tuning, pruning, quantization, distillation, reinforcement learning and synthetic data augmentation.
Fine-tuning uses additional training data to tailor an AI model for specific domains and applications. This can be done using an organization's internal datasets, or with pairs of sample model input and outputs.
Distillation requires a pair of AI models: a large, complex teacher model and a lightweight student model. In the most common distillation technique, called offline distillation, the student model learns to mimic the outputs of a pretrained teacher model.
Reinforcement learning, or RL, is a machine learning technique that uses a reward model to train an agent to make decisions that align with a specific use case. The agent aims to make decisions that maximize cumulative rewards over time as it interacts with an environment - for example, a chatbot LLM that is positively reinforced by thumbs up reactions from users. This technique is known as reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF). Another, newer technique, reinforcement learning from AI feedback (RLAIF), instead uses feedback from AI models to guide the learning process, streamlining post-training efforts.
Best-of-n sampling generates multiple outputs from a language model and selects the one with the highest reward score based on a reward model. It's often used to improve an AI's outputs without modifying model parameters, offering an alternative to fine-tuning with reinforcement learning.
Search methods explore a range of potential decision paths before selecting a final output. This post-training technique can iteratively improve the model's responses
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
06/09/2026
June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
17/06/2026
EVS has announced it has received the EcoVadis Gold Medal for sustainability performance, ranking among the top 5% of companies globally in the Technology/Mid-S...
17/06/2026
Chyron has released Weather 2.4, an update to its weather suite for broadcasters and meteorologists. The release focuses on enhancements to the DataFlow module,...
17/06/2026
VSiN, The Sports Betting Network, has announced the launch of Best Bets TV, a free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) channel. The 24/7 channel is currently avail...
17/06/2026
DAZN's Team Whistle and Snap Inc. have announced a creator program centered ...
17/06/2026
LiveU is providing video transmission technology for broadcasters, production companies, and public safety agencies across North America's busy Summer of So...
17/06/2026
The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) has announced that Laurens Grant and Jacob Ullman have joined its Board of Directors. Chief of Staf...
17/06/2026
Akta, the AI-First SaaS video platform for modern broadcast and streaming operations, today announced that its video platform is now generally available on Orac...
17/06/2026
This recent graduate from Houston found inspiration in technical directing and now eyes a future career in sports production...
17/06/2026
Audio-Technica (booth C7959) arrives at InfoComm 2026 in Las Vegas with a slate ...
17/06/2026
SNS has published a guide addressing growing demand for AI-powered video indexing, transcription, facial recognition, and searchable metadata across media libra...
17/06/2026
Providius has announced Providius Direct, a workflow for investigating network i...
17/06/2026
NEP Group has announced the commercial availability of NEP Platform, a software ...
17/06/2026
A new white paper examining Secure Reliable Transport (SRT) and Reliable Interne...
17/06/2026
New research from subscription bundling platform Bango finds that younger sports fans are increasingly consuming sport through highlights, clips, and social med...
17/06/2026
SMPTE has announced that its complete Standards catalog is now freely available to the global media technology community, including all published SMPTE Standard...
17/06/2026
Harmonic has completed the sale of its Video Business to MediaKind for $145 mill...
17/06/2026
Omaha Productions will produce the 2026 World Series of Poker (WSOP) in Las Vega...
17/06/2026
New features, changes & bug fixes
SoundBridge have just released another update for their remote collaboration-focused DAW - reviewed here in SOS March 2026...
17/06/2026
Valve-based front end for digital & modelling rigs
The latest addition to Fryette's product range delivers a packed-down, pedalboard-friendly version of...
17/06/2026
GearExpo UK - 27 June 2026
Sound On Sound are proud to announce GearExpo UK, a major new recording and music technology exhibition in London! This is the bi...
17/06/2026
SAM monitoring line-up gains Dante and AES67 support
The latest expansion of Genelec's UNIO monitoring ecosystem introduces a new device that provides D...
17/06/2026
The R&S PR300 portable receiver from Rohde & Schwarz sets new standards in spect...
17/06/2026
Elt Group and Rohde & Schwarz sign a cooperation agreement to explore commercial...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
The Immersive Supervisor Emerges as Hollywood's Next Production Role
Brie Clayton June 17, 2026
0 Comments
Above image: On set live immersive revi...
17/06/2026
Vertical Musical Playback Shot with Blackmagic PYXIS 6K
Brie Clayton June 17, 2026
0 Comments
Large format sensor and DaVinci Resolve workflow used fo...
17/06/2026
DAZ 3D Launches New Game-Ready Character Assets Built for Modern Engines and Pro...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/06/2026
Montr al, Quebec, June 11, 2026 Kiloview, a leading provider of AV-over-IP and NDI -based video transmission solutions, today announced a distribution partner...
17/06/2026
Changsha, China, June 15, 2026 Kiloview officially announced the launch of U4 IP Video Dock, a compact IP video decoder and output dock designed to bring prof...
17/06/2026
Save 50% on All Ivory II Pianos and Collections
Were halfway through the year, and we're cutting prices in half for the Ivory II Summer Sale!
For a limite...
17/06/2026
Wednesday 17 June 2026
Two in three fans will connect to venue WiFi this World ...
17/06/2026
Visibility builds credibility - the tools you use every day, now visible on your LinkedIn profile Published on Jun 17, 2026 Categories: Company News, Product ...
17/06/2026
Transaction Positions Harmonic as a Pure-Play Broadband Company SAN JOSE, Calif. - June 17, 2026 - Harmonic Inc. (NASDAQ: HLIT), the worldwide leader in virtual...
17/06/2026
FOX Advertising To Launch Industry's First End-to-End Agentic Advertising Pl...
17/06/2026
How SGN is future-proofing critical national infrastructure with Arqiva Managed Connectivity.
When disruption becomes the norm As Storm Eunice tore across the ...
17/06/2026
The RT Concert Orchestra will bring the timeless music of The Beach Boys to aud...
17/06/2026
Calibr-Skaggs awarded $5.1M by NIH to develop long-acting hepatitis B virus therapy A new program aims to replace a daily HBV drug with once-monthly or even qua...
16/06/2026
Thomson's highly regarded expert-led online learning courses are now easier to access on the go via our new App.
Available now on Google Play Store, the J...
16/06/2026
Neumann.Berlin has released firmware version 2.0 for the MT 48 audio interface, adding plugin compatibility, expanded Dante networking options, broadcast encode...
16/06/2026
TVNewsCheck has announced that nominations are now open for its 2027 Women in Technology Awards, to be presented at NAB Show 2027 on Tuesday, April 6 in the Med...