# UserSimCRS v2: Simulation-Based Evaluation for Conversational Recommender Systems

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.04588 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.04588/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 4 Dec 2025.

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [PsyBer-Agent: A Psychology-Driven User Agent for Recommender Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.13989/) (2026)
- [Prompt or Policy? Optimizing Physician Slate Presentations with LLM User Simulators](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.18309/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Resources for simulation-based evaluation of conversational recommender systems (CRSs) are scarce. The UserSimCRS toolkit was introduced to address this gap. In this work, we present UserSimCRS v2, a significant upgrade aligning the toolkit with state-of-the-art research. Key extensions include an enhanced agenda-based user simulator, introduction of large language model-based simulators, integration for a wider range of CRSs and datasets, and new LLM-as-a-judge evaluation utilities. We demonstrate these extensions in a case study.