Related papers: On the Convergence of Step Decay Step-Size for Sto…
Stochastic gradient descent is the method of choice for large scale optimization of machine learning objective functions. Yet, its performance is greatly variable and heavily depends on the choice of the stepsizes. This has motivated a…
This work establishes new convergence guarantees for gradient descent in smooth convex optimization via a computer-assisted analysis technique. Our theory allows nonconstant stepsize policies with frequent long steps potentially violating…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) is a simple and popular method to solve stochastic optimization problems which arise in machine learning. For strongly convex problems, its convergence rate was known to be O(\log(T)/T), by running SGD for…
This paper introduces a novel approach to enhance the performance of the stochastic gradient descent (SGD) algorithm by incorporating a modified decay step size based on $\frac{1}{\sqrt{t}}$. The proposed step size integrates a logarithmic…
Stochastic (sub)gradient methods require step size schedule tuning to perform well in practice. Classical tuning strategies decay the step size polynomially and lead to optimal sublinear rates on (strongly) convex problems. An alternative…
Training a neural network with the gradient descent algorithm gives rise to a discrete-time nonlinear dynamical system. Consequently, behaviors that are typically observed in these systems emerge during training, such as convergence to an…
Large-scale optimization problems require algorithms both effective and efficient. One such popular and proven algorithm is Stochastic Gradient Descent which uses first-order gradient information to solve these problems. This paper studies…
When training neural networks, it has been widely observed that a large step size is essential in stochastic gradient descent (SGD) for obtaining superior models. However, the effect of large step sizes on the success of SGD is not well…
We introduce a novel dynamic learning-rate scheduling scheme grounded in theory with the goal of simplifying the manual and time-consuming tuning of schedules in practice. Our approach is based on estimating the locally-optimal stepsize,…
This work investigates stepsize-based acceleration of gradient descent with {\em anytime} convergence guarantees. For smooth (non-strongly) convex optimization, we propose a stepsize schedule that allows gradient descent to achieve…
This work considers stepsize schedules for gradient descent on smooth convex objectives. We extend the existing literature and propose a unified technique for constructing stepsizes with analytic bounds for an arbitrary number of…
Many popular learning-rate schedules for deep neural networks combine a decaying trend with local perturbations that attempt to escape saddle points and bad local minima. We derive convergence guarantees for bandwidth-based step-sizes, a…
Bilevel optimization is a central tool in machine learning for high-dimensional hyperparameter tuning. Its applications are vast; for instance, in imaging it can be used for learning data-adaptive regularizers and optimizing forward…
We consider gradient descent with constant stepsizes and derive exact worst-case convergence rates on the minimum gradient norm of the iterates. Our analysis covers all possible stepsizes and arbitrary upper/lower bounds on the curvature of…
Gradient descent and stochastic gradient descent are central to modern machine learning, yet their behavior under large step sizes remains theoretically unclear. Recent work suggests that acceleration often arises near the edge of…
Stochastic gradient descent is a canonical tool for addressing stochastic optimization problems, and forms the bedrock of modern machine learning and statistics. In this work, we seek to balance the fact that attenuating step-size is…
A vast literature on convergence guarantees for gradient descent and derived methods exists at the moment. However, a simple practical situation remains unexplored: when a fixed step size is used, can we expect gradient descent to converge…
We consider the stochastic approximation problem where a convex function has to be minimized, given only the knowledge of unbiased estimates of its gradients at certain points, a framework which includes machine learning methods based on…
Recent results show that vanilla gradient descent can be accelerated for smooth convex objectives, merely by changing the stepsize sequence. We show that this can lead to surprisingly large errors indefinitely, and therefore ask: Is there…
Gradient-based iterative optimization methods are the workhorse of modern machine learning. They crucially rely on careful tuning of parameters like learning rate and momentum. However, one typically sets them using heuristic approaches…