Semi-Supervised and Unsupervised Deep Visual Learning: A Survey
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Abstract (arXiv)
State-of-the-art deep learning models are often trained with a large amount of costly labeled training data. However, requiring exhaustive manual annotations may degrade the model's generalizability in the limited-label regime. Semi-supervised learning and unsupervised learning offer promising paradigms to learn from an abundance of unlabeled visual data. Recent progress in these paradigms has indicated the strong benefits of leveraging unlabeled data to improve model generalization and provide better model initialization. In this survey, we review the recent advanced deep learning algorithms on semi-supervised learning (SSL) and unsupervised learning (UL) for visual recognition from a unified perspective. To offer a holistic understanding of the state-of-the-art in these areas, we propose a unified taxonomy. We categorize existing representative SSL and UL with comprehensive and insightful analysis to highlight their design rationales in different learning scenarios and applications in different computer vision tasks. Lastly, we discuss the emerging trends and open challenges in SSL and UL to shed light on future critical research directions.
Key facts. Cited by 52 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Builds on 220 of its 319 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 24 Aug 2022.
Builds on
220 of 319 references.
References · 220
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50 most cited of 220 All 220 (JSON)
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Citing papers per year: 2022: 2; 2023: 18; 2024: 13; 2025: 16; 2026: 3.
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- 2023A Comprehensive Survey on Test-Time Adaptation under Distribution Shiftscited by 353
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- 2023Uncertainty-inspired Open Set Learning for Retinal Anomaly Identificationcited by 18
- 2022A soft nearest-neighbor framework for continual semi-supervised learningcited by 17
- 2023Label-Efficient Learning in Agriculture: A Comprehensive Reviewcited by 16
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- 2026Practical Insights into Semi-Supervised Object Detection Approaches19 Jan 2026
- 2025Wasserstein distance based semi-supervised manifold learning and application to GNSS multi-path detection5 Dec 2025
- 2025Rethinking Hebbian Principle: Low-Dimensional Structural Projection for Unsupervised Learning16 Oct 2025
- 2025Normality Calibration in Semi-supervised Graph Anomaly Detection2 Oct 2025
- 2025Category Discovery: An Open-World Perspective26 Sep 2025
- 2025nnFilterMatch: A Unified Semi-Supervised Learning Framework with Uncertainty-Aware Pseudo-Label Filtering for Efficient Medical Segmentation24 Sep 2025
- 2025Feature-Space Planes Searcher: A Universal Domain Adaptation Framework for Interpretability and Computational Efficiency26 Aug 2025
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