arXiv AI

Toward Efficient Agents: Memory, Tool learning, and Planning

arXiv:2601. 14192v2 Announce Type: replace Abstract: Recent years have witnessed increasing interest in extending large language models into agentic systems.

arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 10

Rethinking the Evaluation of Efficiency Methods for Multi-Agent Systems

The paper critiques current evaluations of efficiency methods for large language model–based multi‑agent systems, arguing that reported gains are often inflated by method‑specific prompts and starting topologies. It introduces a controlled, MAS‑demanding diagnostic benchmark that standardizes the backbone model, agent registry, and runtime, and systematically varies topology, scale, depth, and tool use. The authors find that many claimed efficiency improvements are setup‑dependent, sometimes stemming from structural collapse or random pruning rather than genuine, robust gains.

By Jiamu Zhang, Lingxi Zhang, Pengjun Lu, Qiyue Zhang, Yu-Neng Chuang, Zhengchen Li, Shuai Xu, Vipin Chaudhary, Hanjie Chen
Hugging Face Trending Papers
Aug 3

CRISP: Critical Step Perception for Training Efficient Deep Search Agents

Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly extended into deep search agents that solve complex questions through multi-step interaction with external search and browsing tools. However, existing agents often incur substantial computational and interaction costs, generating lengthy trajectories that contain redundant queries, inefficient exploration, and irrelevant observations.

arXiv Computation and Language
Sep 21

MemoryArena: Benchmarking Agent Memory in Interdependent Multi-Session Agentic Tasks

MemoryArena is a new evaluation gym that benchmarks agent memory in interdependent multi‑session tasks. Unlike prior benchmarks that test memorization or single‑session action in isolation, MemoryArena requires agents to acquire memory while interacting with the environment and then use that memory to guide future decisions across a range of tasks such as web navigation, planning, information search, and formal reasoning. The benchmark reveals that agents excelling on existing long‑context memory tests perform poorly here, highlighting a gap in current memory evaluation methods.

By Zexue He, Yu Wang, Churan Zhi, Yuanzhe Hu, Tzu-Ping Chen, Lang Yin, Ze Chen, Tong Arthur Wu, Siru Ouyang, Zihan Wang, Jiaxin Pei, Julian McAuley, Yejin Choi, Alex Pentland
arXiv AI
6d ago

Agentick: A Unified Benchmark for General Sequential Decision-Making Agents

Agentick is a unified benchmark for sequential decision‑making agents that evaluates RL, LLM, VLM, hybrid, and human agents on 37 procedurally generated tasks across six capability categories, four difficulty levels, and five observation modalities via a single Gymnasium‑compatible interface. It includes a Coding API, oracle reference policies, pre‑built SFT datasets, a composable agent harness, and a live leaderboard. An evaluation of 27 configurations and over 90,000 episodes shows no single approach dominates, with GPT‑5 mini leading overall, PPO excelling in planning and multi‑agent tasks, and the reasoning harness boosting LLM performance by 3‑10×, while ASCII observations outperform natural language.

By Roger Creus Castanyer, Pablo Samuel Castro, Glen Berseth
arXiv AI
Aug 11

Not Worth Another Token: Marginal Value Estimation for Efficient Deep Research Agents

arXiv:2608. 08389v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Long-horizon research agents solve open-ended tasks through iterative retrieval, aggregation, and synthesis, but context grows rapidly while the marginal value of additional evidence often declines.

By Harshitha Kolukuluru, Reshma Ashok, Kirat Arora, Evan William Ciccarelli, Nischal Ashok Kumar, Lunyiu Nie, Franck Dernoncourt, Samyadeep Basu, Ryan A. Rossi, Nedim Lipka
arXiv AI
Sep 17

RideWay: Benchmarking Efficient Task Completion for Tool-Using Language Agents

RideWay is a new benchmark that evaluates ride‑hailing language agents not just on task completion but on interaction efficiency. It introduces the Efficiency Utility metric, which penalizes agents for excessive tool calls and user‑facing turns relative to a task‑specific reference effort, with human preferences used to calibrate the penalties. Across 58 tasks and 24 models, the metric shows that extra dialogue is penalized more heavily than extra tool use, and it achieves high accuracy in distinguishing trajectories that differ in turns but struggles when differences are only in tool calls.

By Qingnuan Han, Boli Fang, Mingzhi Hou, Claire Liu