# YOLOv11: An Overview of the Key Architectural Enhancements

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.17725 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.17725/

## Key facts

- Cited by 425 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 11 of its 22 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 23 Oct 2024.

## Builds on (most cited first, 11 of 11)

- [You Only Look Once: Unified, Real-Time Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1506.02640/) (2015)
- [YOLOv3: An Incremental Improvement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1804.02767/) (2018)
- [YOLOv4: Optimal Speed and Accuracy of Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.10934/) (2020)
- [YOLO9000: Better, Faster, Stronger](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.08242/) (2016)
- [YOLOv7: Trainable bag-of-freebies sets new state-of-the-art for real-time object detectors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2207.02696/) (2022)
- [Object Detection in 20 Years: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1905.05055/) (2019)
- [Object Detection with Deep Learning: A Review](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.05511/) (2018)
- [YOLOv10: Real-Time End-to-End Object Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.14458/) (2024)
- [YOLOv9: Learning What You Want to Learn Using Programmable Gradient Information](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.13616/) (2024)
- [YOLOv6: A Single-Stage Object Detection Framework for Industrial Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2209.02976/) (2022)
- [What is YOLOv5: A deep look into the internal features of the popular object detector](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.20892/) (2024)

## Built on by (most cited first, 30 of 425)

- [Cosmos World Foundation Model Platform for Physical AI](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.03575/) (2025)
- [Video models are zero-shot learners and reasoners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.20328/) (2025)
- [HunyuanCustom: A Multimodal-Driven Architecture for Customized Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.04512/) (2025)
- [Cosmos-Drive-Dreams: Scalable Synthetic Driving Data Generation with World Foundation Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.09042/) (2025)
- [ReconVLA: Reconstructive Vision-Language-Action Model as Effective Robot Perceiver](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.10333/) (2025)
- [GEM: A Generalizable Ego-Vision Multimodal World Model for Fine-Grained Ego-Motion, Object Dynamics, and Scene Composition Control](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.11198/) (2024)
- [StreamForest: Efficient Online Video Understanding with Persistent Event Memory](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.24871/) (2025)
- [Detect Anything via Next Point Prediction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.12798/) (2025)
- [InverseBench: Benchmarking Plug-and-Play Diffusion Priors for Inverse Problems in Physical Sciences](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.11043/) (2025)
- [CreatiLayout: Siamese Multimodal Diffusion Transformer for Creative Layout-to-Image Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.03859/) (2024)
- [MotionCanvas: Cinematic Shot Design with Controllable Image-to-Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.04299/) (2025)
- [MultiShotMaster: A Controllable Multi-Shot Video Generation Framework](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.03041/) (2025)
- [EliGen: Entity-Level Controlled Image Generation with Regional Attention](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.01097/) (2025)
- [Orak: A Foundational Benchmark for Training and Evaluating LLM Agents on Diverse Video Games](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.03610/) (2025)
- [EchoShot: Multi-Shot Portrait Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.15838/) (2025)
- [ShotStream: Streaming Multi-Shot Video Generation for Interactive Storytelling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.25746/) (2026)
- [Video-STAR: Reinforcing Open-Vocabulary Action Recognition with Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.08480/) (2025)
- [Out of Sight but Not Out of Mind: Hybrid Memory for Dynamic Video World Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.25716/) (2026)
- [FunGraph: Functionality Aware 3D Scene Graphs for Language-Prompted Scene Interaction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.07909/) (2025)
- [LayerD: Decomposing Raster Graphic Designs into Layers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.25134/) (2025)
- [Roboflow100-VL: A Multi-Domain Object Detection Benchmark for Vision-Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.20612/) (2025)
- [OmniV2V: Versatile Video Generation and Editing via Dynamic Content Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.01801/) (2025)
- [FRED: The Florence RGB-Event Drone Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.05163/) (2025)
- [PolyVivid: Vivid Multi-Subject Video Generation with Cross-Modal Interaction and Enhancement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.07848/) (2025)
- [UAV-DETR: Efficient End-to-End Object Detection for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Imagery](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.01855/) (2025)
- [YOLOv8 to YOLO11: A Comprehensive Architecture In-depth Comparative Review](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.13400/) (2025)
- [Memory-Centric Embodied Question Answering](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.13948/) (2025)
- [AI Can Learn Scientific Taste](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.14473/) (2026)
- [AlayaWorld: Interactive Long-Horizon World Modeling -- Full Technical Report](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.18367/) (2026)
- [WildScore: Benchmarking MLLMs in-the-Wild Symbolic Music Reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.04744/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

This study presents an architectural analysis of YOLOv11, the latest iteration in the YOLO (You Only Look Once) series of object detection models. We examine the models architectural innovations, including the introduction of the C3k2 (Cross Stage Partial with kernel size 2) block, SPPF (Spatial Pyramid Pooling - Fast), and C2PSA (Convolutional block with Parallel Spatial Attention) components, which contribute in improving the models performance in several ways such as enhanced feature extraction. The paper explores YOLOv11's expanded capabilities across various computer vision tasks, including object detection, instance segmentation, pose estimation, and oriented object detection (OBB). We review the model's performance improvements in terms of mean Average Precision (mAP) and computational efficiency compared to its predecessors, with a focus on the trade-off between parameter count and accuracy. Additionally, the study discusses YOLOv11's versatility across different model sizes, from nano to extra-large, catering to diverse application needs from edge devices to high-performance computing environments. Our research provides insights into YOLOv11's position within the broader landscape of object detection and its potential impact on real-time computer vision applications.