# StoCFL: A Stochastically Clustered Federated Learning Framework for Non-IID Data with Dynamic Client Participation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.00897 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.00897/

## Key facts

- Cited by 4 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 30 of its 54 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 2 Mar 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 30)

- [Communication-Efficient Learning of Deep Networks from Decentralized Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1602.05629/) (2016)
- [Deep Learning Face Attributes in the Wild](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1411.7766/) (2014)
- [Advances and Open Problems in Federated Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.04977/) (2019)
- [Federated Optimization in Heterogeneous Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.06127/) (2018)
- [Gradient Episodic Memory for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.08840/) (2017)
- [Federated Learning with Non-IID Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1806.00582/) (2018)
- [LEAF: A Benchmark for Federated Settings](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.01097/) (2018)
- [Ditto: Fair and Robust Federated Learning Through Personalization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.04221/) (2020)
- [Personalized Federated Learning with Moreau Envelopes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.08848/) (2020)
- [Federated Learning on Non-IID Data Silos: An Experimental Study](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2102.02079/) (2021)
- [Federated Learning Based on Dynamic Regularization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.04263/) (2021)
- [Train faster, generalize better: Stability of stochastic gradient descent](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1509.01240/) (2015)
- [An Efficient Framework for Clustered Federated Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.04088/) (2020)
- [Clustered Federated Learning: Model-Agnostic Distributed Multi-Task Optimization under Privacy Constraints](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1910.01991/) (2019)
- [Federated Machine Learning: Concept and Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1902.04885/) (2019)
- [Three Approaches for Personalization with Applications to Federated Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.10619/) (2020)
- [The Non-IID Data Quagmire of Decentralized Machine Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1910.00189/) (2019)
- [Federated learning with hierarchical clustering of local updates to improve training on non-IID data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.11791/) (2020)
- [Federated Multi-Task Learning under a Mixture of Distributions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.10252/) (2021)
- [FedBABU: Towards Enhanced Representation for Federated Image Classification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.06042/) (2021)
- [Multi-Center Federated Learning: Clients Clustering for Better Personalization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.08647/) (2021)
- [Revisiting Weighted Aggregation in Federated Learning with Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.10911/) (2023)
- [FedLab: A Flexible Federated Learning Framework](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.11621/) (2021)
- [Flexible Clustered Federated Learning for Client-Level Data Distribution Shift](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.09749/) (2021)
- [On the Convergence of Clustered Federated Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2202.06187/) (2022)
- [Motley: Benchmarking Heterogeneity and Personalization in Federated Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.09262/) (2022)
- [Towards Federated Clustering: A Federated Fuzzy c-Means Algorithm (FFCM)](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.07316/) (2022)
- [Data Heterogeneity-Robust Federated Learning via Group Client Selection in Industrial IoT](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2202.01512/) (2022)
- [A Survey of Trustworthy Federated Learning with Perspectives on Security, Robustness, and Privacy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.10637/) (2023)
- [Heterogeneous Federated Learning via Grouped Sequential-to-Parallel Training](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.12976/) (2022)

## Built on by (most cited first, 4 of 4)

- [A survey on Clustered Federated Learning: Taxonomy, Analysis and Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.17512/) (2025)
- [Encryption-Compatible Clustered Federated Learning via Distributed Expectation-Maximization over Metadata](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.28338/) (2026)
- [MoE Router-Guided Clustering for Heterogeneous Federated Instruction Tuning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.15311/) (2026)
- [Momentum-Guided Federated Split Distillation for Personalized Temporal Edge Intelligence](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.31159/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Federated learning is a distributed learning framework that takes full advantage of private data samples kept on edge devices. In real-world federated learning systems, these data samples are often decentralized and Non-Independently Identically Distributed (Non-IID), causing divergence and performance degradation in the federated learning process. As a new solution, clustered federated learning groups federated clients with similar data distributions to impair the Non-IID effects and train a better model for every cluster. However, existing CFL algorithms are ineffective because they lack an information-sharing mechanism across clusters resulting in low data efficiency and model performance. Meanwhile, their performance is highly subjected to ideal client clustering results which are practically unavailable. This paper proposes StoCFL, a novel clustered federated learning framework for generic Non-IID issues. In detail, StoCFL implements a flexible CFL framework that supports an arbitrary proportion of client participation and newly joined clients for a varying FL system, while maintaining a great improvement in model performance. The intensive experiments are conducted by using four basic Non-IID settings and a real-world dataset. The results show that StoCFL could obtain promising cluster results even when the number of clusters is unknown. Based on the client clustering results, models trained with StoCFL outperform baseline approaches in a variety of scenarios.