mlsanityData to 14 Oct 2026

Generative to Agentic AI: Survey, Conceptualization, and Challenges

arXiv 2504.18875 ↗First posted 26 Apr 2025cs.AIcited by 33

On the map: LLM agents and tool use → General LLM agent frameworks and benchmarks

Abstract (arXiv)

Agentic Artificial Intelligence (AI) builds upon Generative AI (GenAI). It constitutes the next major step in the evolution of AI with much stronger reasoning and interaction capabilities that enable more autonomous behavior to tackle complex tasks. Since the initial release of ChatGPT (3.5), Generative AI has seen widespread adoption, giving users firsthand experience. However, the distinction between Agentic AI and GenAI remains less well understood. To address this gap, our survey is structured in two parts. In the first part, we compare GenAI and Agentic AI using existing literature, discussing their key characteristics, how Agentic AI remedies limitations of GenAI, and the major steps in GenAI's evolution toward Agentic AI. This section is intended for a broad audience, including academics in both social sciences and engineering, as well as industry professionals. It provides the necessary insights to comprehend novel applications that are possible with Agentic AI but not with GenAI. In the second part, we deep dive into novel aspects of Agentic AI, including recent developments and practical concerns such as defining agents. Finally, we discuss several challenges that could serve as a future research agenda, while cautioning against risks that can emerge when exceeding human intelligence.

Key facts. Cited by 33 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026). Placed in General LLM agent frameworks and benchmarks, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use. Builds on 101 of its 213 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 26 Apr 2025.

Builds on

101 of 213 references.

Closest ancestors · 12

Same direction, newest first

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  2. 2025Survey on Evaluation of LLM-based Agents20 Mar
  3. 2024Automated Design of Agentic Systems15 Aug
  4. 2024EvoAgent: Towards Automatic Multi-Agent Generation via Evolutionary Algorithms20 Jun
  5. 2024Exploring Large Language Model based Intelligent Agents: Definitions, Methods, and Prospects7 Jan
  6. 2023Language Agent Tree Search Unifies Reasoning Acting and Planning in Language Models6 Oct
  7. 2023ChatEval: Towards Better LLM-based Evaluators through Multi-Agent Debate14 Aug
  8. 2023MetaGPT: Meta Programming for A Multi-Agent Collaborative Framework1 Aug
  9. 2023Unleashing the Emergent Cognitive Synergy in Large Language Models: A Task-Solving Agent through Multi-Persona Self-Collaboration11 Jul
  10. 2023Building Cooperative Embodied Agents Modularly with Large Language Models5 Jul
  11. 2023Describe, Explain, Plan and Select: Interactive Planning with Large Language Models Enables Open-World Multi-Task Agents3 Feb
  12. 2022A Generalist Agent12 May

Other references · 89

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  8. 2022Self-Consistency Improves Chain of Thought Reasoning in Language Modelscited by 5,708
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  9. 2021Measuring Coding Challenge Competence With APPScited by 902
  10. 2020On Faithfulness and Factuality in Abstractive Summarizationcited by 900
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  13. 2023LLM+P: Empowering Large Language Models with Optimal Planning Proficiencycited by 501
  14. 2024AgentHarm: A Benchmark for Measuring Harmfulness of LLM Agentscited by 437
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  17. 2025Chain of Draft: Thinking Faster by Writing Lesscited by 297
  18. 2024To CoT or not to CoT? Chain-of-thought helps mainly on math and symbolic reasoningcited by 263
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  37. 2023User Behavior Simulation with Large Language Model based Agentscited by 140
  38. 2025LLMs Can Easily Learn to Reason from Demonstrations Structure, not content, is what matters!cited by 132

50 most cited of 89 All 89 (JSON)

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Cited by year (2026 to 14 Oct)

Citing papers per year: 2025: 19; 2026: 14.

33 papers.

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  1. 2025From AI for Science to Agentic Science: A Survey on Autonomous Scientific Discoverycited by 77
  2. 2025TRiSM for Agentic AI: A Review of Trust, Risk, and Security Management in LLM-based Agentic Multi-Agent Systemscited by 59
  3. 2025Agentic AI: A Comprehensive Survey of Architectures, Applications, and Future Directionscited by 48
  4. 2025Vibe Coding vs. Agentic Coding: Fundamentals and Practical Implications of Agentic AIcited by 42
  5. 2025Towards Agentic RAG with Deep Reasoning: A Survey of RAG-Reasoning Systems in LLMscited by 42
  6. 2025SR-Scientist: Scientific Equation Discovery With Agentic AIcited by 35
  7. 2025Agentic AI Security: Threats, Defenses, Evaluation, and Open Challengescited by 28
  8. 2026A Survey of Agentic AI and Cybersecurity: Challenges, Opportunities and Use-case Prototypescited by 22
  9. 2025Position: Collaborative Agentic AI Needs Interoperability Across Ecosystemscited by 8
  10. 2025From Multi-Agent Systems and the Semantic Web to Agentic AI: A Unified Narrative of the Web of Agentscited by 7
  11. 2025Federation of Agents: A Semantics-Aware Communication Fabric for Large-Scale Agentic AIcited by 7
  12. 2025URSA: The Universal Research and Scientific Agentcited by 6
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  4. 2025Agentic AI Systems in Electrical Power Systems Engineering: Current State-of-the-Art and Challengescited by 3
  5. 2026Yes FLoReNce, I Will Do Better Next Time! Agentic Feedback Reasoning for Humorous Meme Detectioncited by 3
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  7. 2025Moral Responsibility or Obedience: What Do We Want from AI?cited by 2
  8. 2025What Challenges Do Developers Face in AI Agent Systems? An Empirical Study on Stack Overflow & GitHub Issuescited by 2
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  10. 2026TabAgent: A Framework for Replacing Agentic Generative Components with Tabular-Textual Classifierscited by 2
  11. 2026A Unified Framework to Quantify Cultural Intelligence of AIcited by 2
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  14. 2025Triadic Fusion of Cognitive, Functional, and Causal Dimensions for Explainable LLMs: The TAXAL Frameworkcited by 1
  15. 2026From Language to Action: Can LLM-Based Agents Be Used for Embodied Robot Cognition?cited by 1
  16. 2026Design Methodology and Performance Trade-offs Management for Distributed and Compound AI Systemscited by 1
  17. 2026Towards a Declarative Agentic Layer for Intelligent Agents in MCP-Based Server Ecosystemscited by 0
  18. 2026Agentic Fog: A Policy-driven Framework for Distributed Intelligence in Fog Computingcited by 0
  19. 2026Autonoma: A Hierarchical Multi-Agent Framework for End-to-End Workflow Automationcited by 0
  20. 2026Assistance to Autonomy: A Systematic Literature Review of Agentic AI across the Software Development Life Cyclecited by 0
  21. 2026MARC v1: An Open-Source Multi-Agent Framework for Clinical AI Reasoning and Coordinationcited by 0

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