Low-Rank Adaptation for Foundation Models: A Comprehensive Review
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Abstract (arXiv)
The rapid advancement of foundation modelslarge-scale neural networks trained on diverse, extensive datasetshas revolutionized artificial intelligence, enabling unprecedented advancements across domains such as natural language processing, computer vision, and scientific discovery. However, the substantial parameter count of these models, often reaching billions or trillions, poses significant challenges in adapting them to specific downstream tasks. Low-Rank Adaptation (LoRA) has emerged as a highly promising approach for mitigating these challenges, offering a parameter-efficient mechanism to fine-tune foundation models with minimal computational overhead. This survey provides the first comprehensive review of LoRA techniques beyond large Language Models to general foundation models, including recent techniques foundations, emerging frontiers and applications of low-rank adaptation across multiple domains. Finally, this survey discusses key challenges and future research directions in theoretical understanding, scalability, and robustness. This survey serves as a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners working with efficient foundation model adaptation.
Key facts. Cited by 35 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Builds on 188 of its 244 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 31 Dec 2024.
Builds on
188 of 244 references.
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Citing papers per year: 2025: 19; 2026: 16.
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- 2025A Survey of Personalized Large Language Models: Progress and Future Directionscited by 65
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- 2025Unveiling Over-Memorization in Finetuning LLMs for Reasoning Taskscited by 10
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- 2026Subspace Control: Turning Constrained Model Steering into Controllable Spectral Optimizationcited by 1
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- 2025Bringing Multi-Modal Multi-Task Federated Foundation Models to Education Domain: Prospects and Challengescited by 0
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- 2026Finer Parameter Steps for Low-Rank PEFT: A Controlled Study with CP Tensor Adapterscited by 0
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- 2026The Hidden Power of Scaling Factor in LoRA Optimization11 Jun 2026
- 2026Finer Parameter Steps for Low-Rank PEFT: A Controlled Study with CP Tensor Adapters29 May 2026
- 2026Reinforcement Learning with Semantic Rewards Enables Low-Resource Language Expansion without Alignment Tax14 May 2026
- 2026An empirical study of LoRA-based fine-tuning of large language models for automated test case generation8 Apr 2026
- 2026EventFace: Event-Based Face Recognition via Structure-Driven Spatiotemporal Modeling8 Apr 2026
- 2026Subspace Control: Turning Constrained Model Steering into Controllable Spectral Optimization5 Apr 2026
- 2026Domain Adaptation of Large Language Models for Polymer-Composite Additive Manufacturing Using Retrieval-Augmented Generation and Fine-Tuning2 Apr 2026
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- 2026Learning Rate Matters: Vanilla LoRA May Suffice for LLM Fine-tuning4 Feb 2026
- 2026When pre-training hurts LoRA fine-tuning: a dynamical analysis via single-index models2 Feb 2026
- 2026A Unified Study of LoRA Variants: Taxonomy, Review, Codebase, and Empirical Evaluation30 Jan 2026
- 2026"Unlimited Realm of Exploration and Experimentation": Methods and Motivations of AI-Generated Sexual Content Creators28 Jan 2026
- 2025Polar Perspectives: Evaluating 2-D LiDAR Projections for Robust Place Recognition with Visual Foundation Models2 Dec 2025
- 2025Comparative Analysis of LoRA-Adapted Embedding Models for Clinical Cardiology Text Representation24 Nov 2025
- 2025DoRAN: Stabilizing Weight-Decomposed Low-Rank Adaptation via Noise Injection and Auxiliary Networks5 Oct 2025
- 2025Hypernetwork-Driven Low-Rank Adaptation Across Attention Heads5 Oct 2025
- 2025Rethinking Parameter Sharing for LLM Fine-Tuning with Multiple LoRAs29 Sep 2025
- 2025Bringing Multi-Modal Multi-Task Federated Foundation Models to Education Domain: Prospects and Challenges9 Sep 2025
- 2025Benchmarking Foundation Models for Mitotic Figure Classification6 Aug 2025
- 2025Unveiling Over-Memorization in Finetuning LLMs for Reasoning Tasks6 Aug 2025
- 2025True Multimodal In-Context Learning Needs Attention to the Visual Context21 Jul 2025
- 2025The Primacy of Magnitude in Low-Rank Adaptation9 Jul 2025
- 2025LoSiA: Efficient High-Rank Fine-Tuning via Subnet Localization and Optimization6 Jul 2025
- 2025ARD-LoRA: Dynamic Rank Allocation for Parameter-Efficient Fine-Tuning of Foundation Models with Heterogeneous Adaptation Needs23 Jun 2025
- 2025LoRMA: Low-Rank Multiplicative Adaptation for LLMs9 Jun 2025
- 2025MLLM-CL: Continual Learning for Multimodal Large Language Models5 Jun 2025
- 2025PDE-Transformer: Efficient and Versatile Transformers for Physics Simulations30 May 2025
- 2025Sparse Activation Editing for Reliable Instruction Following in Narratives22 May 2025
- 2025Diffusion Model Quantization: A Review8 May 2025
- 2025Quantization Error Propagation: Revisiting Layer-Wise Post-Training Quantization13 Apr 2025
- 2025A Survey of Personalized Large Language Models: Progress and Future Directions17 Feb 2025
- 2025Diffusion Model Quantization: A Reviewcited by 6
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- 2025Quantization Error Propagation: Revisiting Layer-Wise Post-Training Quantizationcited by 36
- 2025PDE-Transformer: Efficient and Versatile Transformers for Physics Simulationscited by 29
- 2026Learning Rate Matters: Vanilla LoRA May Suffice for LLM Fine-tuningcited by 9
- 2025The Primacy of Magnitude in Low-Rank Adaptationcited by 7
- 2025ARD-LoRA: Dynamic Rank Allocation for Parameter-Efficient Fine-Tuning of Foundation Models with Heterogeneous Adaptation Needscited by 5
- 2025Sparse Activation Editing for Reliable Instruction Following in Narrativescited by 3
- 2026"Unlimited Realm of Exploration and Experimentation": Methods and Motivations of AI-Generated Sexual Content Creatorscited by 3
- 2025Benchmarking Foundation Models for Mitotic Figure Classificationcited by 2
- 2025DoRAN: Stabilizing Weight-Decomposed Low-Rank Adaptation via Noise Injection and Auxiliary Networkscited by 2
- 2025Polar Perspectives: Evaluating 2-D LiDAR Projections for Robust Place Recognition with Visual Foundation Modelscited by 2
- 2026A Unified Study of LoRA Variants: Taxonomy, Review, Codebase, and Empirical Evaluationcited by 2
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- 2026Generative AI-Based Data Augmentation for Oral Lesion Classification: The PhotoMOCI Dataset and Benchmark28 Sep 2026
- 2026Hyperbolic Multimodal Continual Learning: A Closest-Admissible Solution24 Sep 2026
- 2026Memory Has Geometry: Non-Uniform Geometric Memory for Long-Horizon Personalized AI16 Sep 2026
- 2026The Hidden Power of Scaling Factor in LoRA Optimization11 Jun 2026
- 2026Finer Parameter Steps for Low-Rank PEFT: A Controlled Study with CP Tensor Adapters29 May 2026
- 2026An empirical study of LoRA-based fine-tuning of large language models for automated test case generation8 Apr 2026
- 2026EventFace: Event-Based Face Recognition via Structure-Driven Spatiotemporal Modeling8 Apr 2026
- 2026Learning Rate Matters: Vanilla LoRA May Suffice for LLM Fine-tuning4 Feb 2026
- 2026When pre-training hurts LoRA fine-tuning: a dynamical analysis via single-index models2 Feb 2026
- 2026A Unified Study of LoRA Variants: Taxonomy, Review, Codebase, and Empirical Evaluation30 Jan 2026
- 2026"Unlimited Realm of Exploration and Experimentation": Methods and Motivations of AI-Generated Sexual Content Creators28 Jan 2026
- 2025Polar Perspectives: Evaluating 2-D LiDAR Projections for Robust Place Recognition with Visual Foundation Models2 Dec 2025
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