# TruncQuant: Truncation-Ready Quantization for DNNs with Flexible Weight Bit Precision

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.11431 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.11431/

## Key facts

- Cited by 3 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 27 of its 39 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 13 Jun 2025.

## Builds on (most cited first, 27 of 27)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [EfficientNet: Rethinking Model Scaling for Convolutional Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1905.11946/) (2019)
- [MobileNetV2: Inverted Residuals and Linear Bottlenecks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.04381/) (2018)
- [FlashAttention: Fast and Memory-Efficient Exact Attention with IO-Awareness](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.14135/) (2022)
- [Estimating or Propagating Gradients Through Stochastic Neurons for Conditional Computation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1308.3432/) (2013)
- [Quantization and Training of Neural Networks for Efficient Integer-Arithmetic-Only Inference](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1712.05877/) (2017)
- [A Survey of Quantization Methods for Efficient Neural Network Inference](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.13630/) (2021)
- [Learned Step Size Quantization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1902.08153/) (2019)
- [Up or Down? Adaptive Rounding for Post-Training Quantization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.10568/) (2020)
- [BranchyNet: Fast Inference via Early Exiting from Deep Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1709.01686/) (2017)
- [DoReFa-Net: Training Low Bitwidth Convolutional Neural Networks with Low Bitwidth Gradients](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.06160/) (2016)
- [BRECQ: Pushing the Limit of Post-Training Quantization by Block Reconstruction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2102.05426/) (2021)
- [Slimmable Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1812.08928/) (2018)
- [Understanding Straight-Through Estimator in Training Activation Quantized Neural Nets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.05662/) (2019)
- [Universally Slimmable Networks and Improved Training Techniques](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.05134/) (2019)
- [Binary Neural Networks: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.03333/) (2020)
- [Quantization Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.09464/) (2019)
- [Bit Fusion: Bit-Level Dynamically Composable Architecture for Accelerating Deep Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1712.01507/) (2017)
- [Nonuniform-to-Uniform Quantization: Towards Accurate Quantization via Generalized Straight-Through Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.14826/) (2021)
- [Adaptive Inference through Early-Exit Networks: Design, Challenges and Directions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.05022/) (2021)
- [Robust Quantization: One Model to Rule Them All](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.07686/) (2020)
- [DORY: Automatic End-to-End Deployment of Real-World DNNs on Low-Cost IoT MCUs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.07127/) (2020)
- [Any-Precision Deep Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.07346/) (2019)
- [Once Quantization-Aware Training: High Performance Extremely Low-bit Architecture Search](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.04354/) (2020)
- [EQ-Net: Elastic Quantization Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.07650/) (2023)
- [MBQuant: A Novel Multi-Branch Topology Method for Arbitrary Bit-width Network Quantization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.08117/) (2023)
- [FlexiBit: Fully Flexible Precision Bit-parallel Accelerator Architecture for Arbitrary Mixed Precision AI](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.18065/) (2024)

## Built on by (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [MatGPTQ: Efficient and Accurate Inference over Nested Quantized Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.03537/) (2026)
- [MoBiQuant: Mixture-of-Bits Quantization for Token-Adaptive Any-Precision LLM](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.20191/) (2026)
- [ELMoE-3D: Leveraging Intrinsic Elasticity of MoE for Hybrid-Bonding-Enabled Self-Speculative Decoding in On-Premises Serving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.14626/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The deployment of deep neural networks on edge devices is a challenging task due to the increasing complexity of state-of-the-art models, requiring efforts to reduce model size and inference latency. Recent studies explore models operating at diverse quantization settings to find the optimal point that balances computational efficiency and accuracy. Truncation, an effective approach for achieving lower bit precision mapping, enables a single model to adapt to various hardware platforms with little to no cost. However, formulating a training scheme for deep neural networks to withstand the associated errors introduced by truncation remains a challenge, as the current quantization-aware training schemes are not designed for the truncation process. We propose TruncQuant, a novel truncation-ready training scheme allowing flexible bit precision through bit-shifting in runtime. We achieve this by aligning TruncQuant with the output of the truncation process, demonstrating strong robustness across bit-width settings, and offering an easily implementable training scheme within existing quantization-aware frameworks. Our code is released at https://github.com/a2jinhee/TruncQuant.