Web World Models
On the map: World models → World models for language agents
Abstract (arXiv)
Language agents increasingly require persistent worlds in which they can act, remember, and learn. Existing approaches sit at two extremes: conventional web frameworks provide reliable but fixed contexts backed by databases, while fully generative world models aim for unlimited environments at the expense of controllability and practical engineering. In this work, we introduce the Web World Model (WWM), a middle ground where world state and ``physics'' are implemented in ordinary web code to ensure logical consistency, while large language models generate context, narratives, and high-level decisions on top of this structured latent state. We build a suite of WWMs on a realistic web stack, including an infinite travel atlas grounded in real geography, fictional galaxy explorers, web-scale encyclopedic and narrative worlds, and simulation- and game-like environments. Across these systems, we identify practical design principles for WWMs: separating code-defined rules from model-driven imagination, representing latent state as typed web interfaces, and utilizing deterministic generation to achieve unlimited but structured exploration. Our results suggest that web stacks themselves can serve as a scalable substrate for world models, enabling controllable yet open-ended environments. Project Page: https://github.com/Princeton-AI2-Lab/Web-World-Models.
Key facts. Cited by 7 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026). Placed in World models for language agents, one of 11 directions in World models. Builds on 21 of its 25 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 29 Dec 2025.
Builds on
21 of 25 references.
Closest ancestors · 3
Same direction, newest first
- 2024Is Your LLM Secretly a World Model of the Internet? Model-Based Planning for Web Agents10 Nov
- 2023Reasoning with Language Model is Planning with World Model24 May
- 2023Generative Agents: Interactive Simulacra of Human Behavior7 Apr
Other references · 18
- 2022ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Modelscited by 8,695
- 2022Scalable Diffusion Models with Transformerscited by 6,054
- 2023Reflexion: Language Agents with Verbal Reinforcement Learningcited by 4,276
- 2023Voyager: An Open-Ended Embodied Agent with Large Language Modelscited by 2,191
- 2023Self-Supervised Learning from Images with a Joint-Embedding Predictive Architecturecited by 1,039
- 2022Language Models as Zero-Shot Planners: Extracting Actionable Knowledge for Embodied Agentscited by 1,035
- 2018Recurrent World Models Facilitate Policy Evolutioncited by 785
- 2024Thinking in Space: How Multimodal Large Language Models See, Remember, and Recall Spacescited by 611
- 2024Revisiting Feature Prediction for Learning Visual Representations from Videocited by 531
- 2023SOTOPIA: Interactive Evaluation for Social Intelligence in Language Agentscited by 367
- 2022Social Simulacra: Creating Populated Prototypes for Social Computing Systemscited by 301
- 2023Ghost in the Minecraft: Generally Capable Agents for Open-World Environments via Large Language Models with Text-based Knowledge and Memorycited by 289
6 more
- 2023SmartPlay: A Benchmark for LLMs as Intelligent Agentscited by 125
- 2023CLIN: A Continually Learning Language Agent for Rapid Task Adaptation and Generalizationcited by 95
- 2023AgentSims: An Open-Source Sandbox for Large Language Model Evaluationcited by 88
- 2018Playing Text-Adventure Games with Graph-Based Deep Reinforcement Learningcited by 53
- 2023Neuro-Symbolic World Models for Adapting to Open World Noveltycited by 14
- 2024Unbounded: A Generative Infinite Game of Character Life Simulationcited by 14
Built on by
Citing papers per year: 2026: 7.
7 papers.
- 2026Agentic World Modeling: Foundations, Capabilities, Laws, and Beyondcited by 14
- 2026Agentic Environment Engineering for Large Language Models: A Survey of Environment Modeling, Synthesis, Evaluation, and Applicationcited by 8
- 2026OpenWorldLib: A Unified Codebase and Definition of Advanced World Modelscited by 3
- 2026Scalable Environments Drive Generalizable Agentscited by 2
- 2026Specification-Driven Generation and Evaluation of Discrete-Event World Models via the DEVS Formalismcited by 1
- 2026Quo Vadis, World Modeling?cited by 0
- 2026MotiveMob: Motivation as Semantic Action for Closed-Loop Human Mobility Generationcited by 0
- 2026MotiveMob: Motivation as Semantic Action for Closed-Loop Human Mobility Generation8 Oct 2026
- 2026Quo Vadis, World Modeling?3 Aug 2026
- 2026Agentic Environment Engineering for Large Language Models: A Survey of Environment Modeling, Synthesis, Evaluation, and Application10 Jun 2026
- 2026Scalable Environments Drive Generalizable Agents18 May 2026
- 2026Agentic World Modeling: Foundations, Capabilities, Laws, and Beyond24 Apr 2026
- 2026OpenWorldLib: A Unified Codebase and Definition of Advanced World Models6 Apr 2026
- 2026Specification-Driven Generation and Evaluation of Discrete-Event World Models via the DEVS Formalism4 Mar 2026
Similar, not cited
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- 2024Web Agents with World Models: Learning and Leveraging Environment Dynamics in Web Navigation
- 2026World Agent: Can Language Models Keep a World Running?
- 2024Making Large Language Models into World Models with Precondition and Effect Knowledge
- 2021Modeling Worlds in Text
- 2025Text2World: Benchmarking Large Language Models for Symbolic World Model Generation
- 2025From Word to World: Can Large Language Models be Implicit Text-based World Models?
- 2026WebWorld: A Large-Scale World Model for Web Agent Training