
model-pruning
Reduce LLM size and accelerate inference using pruning techniques like Wanda and SparseGPT. Use when compressing models without retraining, achieving 50% sparsity with minimal accuracy loss, or enabling faster inference on hardware accelerators. Covers unstructured pruning, structured pruning, N:M sparsity, magnitude pruning, and one-shot methods.
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Install
Works with every agent the skills CLI supports.
npx skills add https://github.com/orchestra-research/ai-research-skills --skill model-pruning- 01
Install
Run the command in your project. The CLI asks which agents to install for.
- 02
Describe the task
Ask your agent for something this skill covers. It loads model-pruning automatically when relevant.
- 03
Review the result
The agent follows the SKILL.md steps, scripts and references bundled with the skill.
SKILL.md
The instructions your agent reads when the skill is triggered.
Model Pruning: Compressing LLMs
When to Use This Skill
Use Model Pruning when you need to:
- Reduce model size by 40-60% with <1% accuracy loss
- Accelerate inference using hardware-friendly sparsity (2-4× speedup)
- Deploy on constrained hardware (mobile, edge devices)
- Compress without retraining using one-shot methods
- Enable efficient serving with reduced memory footprint
Key Techniques: Wanda (weights × activations), SparseGPT (second-order), structured pruning, N:M sparsity
Papers: Wanda ICLR 2024 (arXiv 2306.11695), SparseGPT (arXiv 2301.00774)
Installation
# Wanda implementation
git clone https://github.com/locuslab/wanda
cd wanda
pip install -r requirements.txt
# Optional: SparseGPT
git clone https://github.com/IST-DASLab/sparsegpt
cd sparsegpt
pip install -e .
# Dependencies
pip install torch transformers accelerate
Quick Start
Wanda Pruning (One-Shot, No Retraining)
Source: ICLR 2024 (arXiv 2306.11695)
import torch
from transformers import AutoModelForCausalLM, AutoTokenizer
# Load model
model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(
"meta-llama/Llama-2-7b-hf",
torch_dtype=torch.float16,
device_map="cuda"
)
tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained("meta-llama/Llama-2-7b-hf")
# Calibration data (small dataset for activation statistics)
calib_data = [
"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.",
"Machine learning is transforming the world.",
"Artificial intelligence powers modern applications.",
]
# Wanda pruning function
def wanda_prune(model, calib_data, sparsity=0.5):
"""
Wanda: Prune by weight magnitude × input activation.
Args:
sparsity: Fraction of weights to prune (0.5 = 50%)
"""
# 1. Collect activation statistics
activations = {}
def hook_fn(name):
def hook(module, input, output):
# Store input activation norms
activations[name] = input[0].detach().abs().mean(dim=0)
return hook
# Register hooks for all linear layers
hooks = []
for name, module in model.named_modules():
if isinstance(module, torch.nn.Linear):
hooks.append(module.register_forward_hook(hook_fn(name)))
# Run calibration data
model.eval()
with torch.no_grad():
for text in calib_data:
inputs = tokenizer(text, return_tensors="pt").to(model.device)
model(**inputs)
# Remove hooks
for hook in hooks:
hook.remove()
# 2. Prune weights based on |weight| × activation
for name, module in model.named_modules():
if isinstance(module, torch.nn.Linear) and name in activations:
W = module.weight.data
act = activations[name]
# Compute importance: |weight| × activation
importance = W.abs() * act.unsqueeze(0)
# Flatten and find threshold
threshold = torch.quantile(importance.flatten(), sparsity)
# Create mask
mask = importance >= threshold
# Apply mask (prune)
W *= mask.float()
return model
# Apply Wanda pruning (50% sparsity, one-shot, no retraining)
pruned_model = wanda_prune(model, calib_data, sparsity=0.5)
# Save
pruned_model.save_pretrained("./llama-2-7b-wanda-50")
SparseGPT (Second-Order Pruning)
Source: arXiv 2301.00774
from sparsegpt import SparseGPT
# Load model
model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained("meta-llama/Llama-2-7b-hf")
# Initialize SparseGPT
pruner = SparseGPT(model)
# Calibration data
calib_data = load_calibration_data() # ~128 samples
# Prune (one-shot, layer-wise reconstruction)
pruned_model = pruner.prune(
calib_data=calib_data,
sparsity=0.5, # 50% sparsity
prunen=0, # Unstructured (0) or N:M structured
prunem=0,
percdamp=0.01, # Damping for Hessian inverse
)
# Results: Near-lossless pruning at 50% sparsity
N:M Structured Pruning (Hardware Accelerator)
def nm_prune(weight, n=2, m=4):
"""
N:M pruning: Keep N weights per M consecutive weights.
Example: 2:4 = keep 2 out of every 4 weights.
Compatible with NVIDIA sparse tensor cores (2:4, 4:8).
"""
# Reshape weight into groups of M
shape = weight.shape
weight_flat = weight.flatten()
# Pad to multiple of M
pad_size = (m - weight_flat.numel() % m) % m
weight_padded = F.pad(weight_flat, (0, pad_size))
# Reshape into (num_groups, m)
weight_grouped = weight_padded.reshape(-1, m)
# Find top-N in each group
_, indices = torch.topk(weight_grouped.abs(), n, dim=-1)
# Create mask
mask = torch.zeros_like(weight_grouped)
mask.scatter_(1, indices, 1.0)
# Apply mask
weight_pruned = weight_grouped * mask
# Reshape back
weight_pruned = weight_pruned.flatten()[:weight_flat.numel()]
return weight_pruned.reshape(shape)
# Apply 2:4 sparsity (NVIDIA hardware)
for name, module in model.named_modules():
if isinstance(module, torch.nn.Linear):
module.weight.data = nm_prune(module.weight.data, n=2, m=4)
# 50% sparsity, 2× speedup on A100 with sparse tensor cores
Core Concepts
1. Pruning Criteria
Magnitude Pruning (baseline):
# Prune weights with smallest absolute values
importance = weight.abs()
threshold = torch.quantile(importance, sparsity)
mask = importance >= threshold
Wanda (weights × activations):
# Importance = |weight| × input_activation
importance = weight.abs() * activation
# Better than magnitude alone (considers usage)
SparseGPT (second-order):
# Uses Hessian (second derivative) for importance
# More accurate but computationally expensive
importance = weight^2 / diag(Hessian)
2. Structured vs Unstructured
Unstructured (fine-grained):
- Prune individual weights
- Higher quality (better accuracy)
- No hardware speedup (irregular sparsity)
Structured (coarse-grained):
- Prune entire neurons, heads, or layers
- Lower quality (more accuracy loss)
- Hardware speedup (regular sparsity)
Semi-structured (N:M):
- Best of both worlds
- 50% sparsity (2:4) → 2× speedup on NVIDIA GPUs
- Minimal accuracy loss
3. Sparsity Patterns
# Unstructured (random)
# [1, 0, 1, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0]
# Pros: Flexible, high quality
# Cons: No speedup
# Structured (block)
# [1, 1, 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0]
# Pros: Hardware friendly
# Cons: More accuracy loss
# N:M (semi-structured)
# [1, 0, 1, 0] [1, 1, 0, 0] (2:4 pattern)
# Pros: Hardware speedup + good quality
# Cons: Requires specific hardware (NVIDIA)
Pruning Strategies
Strategy 1: Gradual Magnitude Pruning
def gradual_prune(model, initial_sparsity=0.0, final_sparsity=0.5, num_steps=100):
"""Gradually increase sparsity during training."""
for step in range(num_steps):
# Current sparsity
current_sparsity = initial_sparsity + (final_sparsity - initial_sparsity) * (step / num_steps)
# Prune at current sparsity
for module in model.modules():
if isinstance(module, torch.nn.Linear):
weight = module.weight.data
threshold = torch.quantile(weight.abs().flatten(), current_sparsity)
mask = weight.abs() >= threshold
weight *= mask.float()
# Train one step
train_step(model)
return model
Strategy 2: Layer-wise Pruning
def layer_wise_prune(model, sparsity_per_layer):
"""Different sparsity for different layers."""
# Early layers: Less pruning (more important)
# Late layers: More pruning (less critical)
sparsity_schedule = {
"layer.0": 0.3, # 30% sparsity
"layer.1": 0.4,
"layer.2": 0.5,
"layer.3": 0.6, # 60% sparsity
}
for name, module in model.named_modules():
if isinstance(module, torch.nn.Linear):
# Find layer index
for layer_name, sparsity in sparsity_schedule.items():
if layer_name in name:
# Prune at layer-specific sparsity
prune_layer(module, sparsity)
break
return model
Strategy 3: Iterative Pruning + Fine-tuning
def iterative_prune_finetune(model, target_sparsity=0.5, iterations=5):
"""Prune gradually with fine-tuning between iterations."""
current_sparsity = 0.0
sparsity_increment = target_sparsity / iterations
for i in range(iterations):
# Increase sparsity
current_sparsity += sparsity_increment
# Prune
prune_model(model, sparsity=current_sparsity)
# Fine-tune (recover accuracy)
fine_tune(model, epochs=2, lr=1e-5)
return model
# Results: Better accuracy than one-shot at high sparsity
Production Deployment
Complete Pruning Pipeline
from transformers import Trainer, TrainingArguments
def production_pruning_pipeline(
model_name="meta-llama/Llama-2-7b-hf",
target_sparsity=0.5,
method="wanda", # or "sparsegpt"
):
# 1. Load model
model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(model_name, torch_dtype=torch.float16)
tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained(model_name)
# 2. Load calibration data
calib_dataset = load_dataset("wikitext", "wikitext-2-raw-v1", split="train[:1000]")
# 3. Apply pruning
if method == "wanda":
pruned_model = wanda_prune(model, calib_dataset, sparsity=target_sparsity)
elif method == "sparsegpt":
pruner = SparseGPT(model)
pruned_model = pruner.prune(calib_dataset, sparsity=target_sparsity)
# 4. (Optional) Fine-tune to recover accuracy
training_args = TrainingArguments(
output_dir="./pruned-model",
num_train_epochs=1,
per_device_train_batch_size=4,
learning_rate=1e-5,
bf16=True,
)
trainer = Trainer(
model=pruned_model,
args=training_args,
train_dataset=finetune_dataset,
)
trainer.train()
# 5. Save
pruned_model.save_pretrained("./pruned-llama-7b-50")
tokenizer.save_pretrained("./pruned-llama-7b-50")
return pruned_model
# Usage
pruned_model = production_pruning_pipeline(
model_name="meta-llama/Llama-2-7b-hf",
target_sparsity=0.5,
method="wanda"
)
Evaluation
from lm_eval import evaluator
# Evaluate pruned vs original model
original_results = evaluator.simple_evaluate(
model="hf",
model_args="pretrained=meta-llama/Llama-2-7b-hf",
tasks=["arc_easy", "hellaswag", "winogrande"],
)
pruned_results = evaluator.simple_evaluate(
model="hf",
model_args="pretrained=./pruned-llama-7b-50",
tasks=["arc_easy", "hellaswag", "winogrande"],
)
# Compare
print(f"Original: {original_results['results']['arc_easy']['acc']:.3f}")
print(f"Pruned: {pruned_results['results']['arc_easy']['acc']:.3f}")
print(f"Degradation: {(original_results - pruned_results):.3f}")
# Typical results at 50% sparsity:
# - Wanda: <1% accuracy loss
# - SparseGPT: <0.5% accuracy loss
# - Magnitude: 2-3% accuracy loss
Best Practices
1. Sparsity Selection
# Conservative (safe)
sparsity = 0.3 # 30%, <0.5% loss
# Balanced (recommended)
sparsity = 0.5 # 50%, ~1% loss
# Aggressive (risky)
sparsity = 0.7 # 70%, 2-5% loss
# Extreme (model-dependent)
sparsity = 0.9 # 90%, significant degradation
2. Method Selection
# One-shot, no retraining → Wanda or SparseGPT
if no_retraining_budget:
use_method = "wanda" # Faster
# Best quality → SparseGPT
if need_best_quality:
use_method = "sparsegpt" # More accurate
# Hardware speedup → N:M structured
if need_speedup:
use_method = "nm_prune" # 2:4 or 4:8
3. Avoid Common Pitfalls
# ❌ Bad: Pruning without calibration data
prune_random(model) # No activation statistics
# ✅ Good: Use calibration data
prune_wanda(model, calib_data)
# ❌ Bad: Too high sparsity in one shot
prune(model, sparsity=0.9) # Massive accuracy loss
# ✅ Good: Gradual or iterative
iterative_prune(model, target=0.9, steps=10)
Performance Comparison
Pruning methods at 50% sparsity (LLaMA-7B):
| Method | Accuracy Loss | Speed | Memory | Retraining Needed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Magnitude | -2.5% | 1.0× | -50% | No |
| Wanda | -0.8% | 1.0× | -50% | No |
| SparseGPT | -0.4% | 1.0× | -50% | No |
| N:M (2:4) | -1.0% | 2.0× | -50% | No |
| Structured | -3.0% | 2.0× | -50% | No |
Source: Wanda paper (ICLR 2024), SparseGPT paper
Resources
- Wanda Paper (ICLR 2024): https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.11695
- Wanda GitHub: https://github.com/locuslab/wanda
- SparseGPT Paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/2301.00774
- SparseGPT GitHub: https://github.com/IST-DASLab/sparsegpt
- NVIDIA Sparse Tensor Cores: https://developer.nvidia.com/blog/accelerating-inference-with-sparsity-using-ampere-and-tensorrt/
FAQ
What does the model-pruning skill do?
Reduce LLM size and accelerate inference using pruning techniques like Wanda and SparseGPT. Use when compressing models without retraining, achieving 50% sparsity with minimal accuracy loss, or enabling faster inference on hardware accelerators. Covers unstructured pruning, structured pruning, N:M sparsity, magnitude pruning, and one-shot methods.
How do I install model-pruning?
Run npx skills add https://github.com/orchestra-research/ai-research-skills --skill model-pruning in your project. The skills CLI detects the agents you use and copies the skill into the right folder. For Claude Code you can also place the skill folder at ~/.claude/skills/model-pruning/ (personal) or .claude/skills/model-pruning/ (project).
Which AI agents can use model-pruning?
Any agent that supports the open Agent Skills format (a folder with a SKILL.md file), including Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Gemini CLI, Windsurf, Cline, OpenCode and more.
Is model-pruning safe to install?
No partner security audit is available yet. Skills can run commands and scripts, so read the SKILL.md and any bundled files before installing.
Who maintains model-pruning?
It is published by orchestra-research in orchestra-research/ai-research-skills. It has 951 recorded installs.
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