mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

Group-Graph Policy Optimization for Long-Horizon Agentic Reinforcement Learning

arXiv 2606.22995 ↗First posted 22 Jun 2026cs.LG cs.AI cs.CLcited by 7

On the map: LLM agents and tool use → Reinforcement learning for LLM agents

Abstract (arXiv)

Group-based Reinforcement Learning (RL) has significantly enhanced Large Language Models (LLMs) in agentic scenarios. To achieve finer-grained policy updates, recent agentic RL frameworks have shifted from trajectory-level to step-level training. However, long-horizon agentic RL suffers from severe reward sparsity and delay, as feedback is often deferred for dozens of interaction steps. While existing step-level frameworks refine training granularity, their credit assignment remains coarse-grained and still treats agent exploration as isolated, linear trajectories. This oversimplified perspective ignores the inherent graph structure of state transitions, leading to high-variance state-value estimation and myopic, localized credit assignment. To overcome these critical bottlenecks, we propose Group-Graph Policy Optimization (G2PO), a novel group-based RL algorithm tailored for multi-turn agentic tasks. G2PO explicitly transforms linear interaction trajectories into a global state-transition graph. By aggregating identical observations across different trajectories, we introduce group-aggregation state-value estimation that reduces sampling variance and trajectory-dependent bias. Furthermore, we redefine agent actions as transitions between state nodes and propose an edge-centric advantage estimation strategy. By globally standardizing Temporal Difference (TD) errors across the entire graph, G2PO explicitly identifies and prioritizes critical transitions that drive absolute task progress. Extensive experiments on representative long-horizon benchmarks-WebShop, ALFWorld, and AppWorld-demonstrate that G2PO substantially outperforms state-of-the-art prompt-based and RL baselines, achieving remarkable success rate improvements of up to 22.2% over GRPO.

Key facts. Cited by 7 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in Reinforcement learning for LLM agents, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use. Builds on 54 of its 61 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 22 Jun 2026.

Builds on

54 of 61 references.

Closest ancestors · 8

Same direction, newest first

  1. 2025AgentRL: Scaling Agentic Reinforcement Learning with a Multi-Turn, Multi-Task Framework5 Oct
  2. 2025LLM Collaboration With Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning6 Aug
  3. 2025Agent Lightning: Train ANY AI Agents with Reinforcement Learning5 Aug
  4. 2025Group-in-Group Policy Optimization for LLM Agent Training16 May
  5. 2025Towards Efficient Online Tuning of VLM Agents via Counterfactual Soft Reinforcement Learning1 May
  6. 2025RAGEN: Understanding Self-Evolution in LLM Agents via Multi-Turn Reinforcement Learning24 Apr
  7. 2025Reinforcement Learning for Long-Horizon Interactive LLM Agents3 Feb
  8. 2023Reflexion: Language Agents with Verbal Reinforcement Learning20 Mar

Other references · 46

  1. 2022Training language models to follow instructions with human feedbackcited by 15,712
  2. 2017Proximal Policy Optimization Algorithmscited by 14,441
  3. 2024DeepSeekMath: Pushing the Limits of Mathematical Reasoning in Open Language Modelscited by 8,851
  4. 2022ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Modelscited by 8,355
  5. 2025Qwen3 Technical Reportcited by 8,195
  6. 2023Direct Preference Optimization: Your Language Model is Secretly a Reward Modelcited by 7,916
  7. 2025DeepSeek-R1: Incentivizing Reasoning Capability in LLMs via Reinforcement Learningcited by 6,146
  8. 2023Efficient Memory Management for Large Language Model Serving with PagedAttentioncited by 5,767
  9. 2023Toolformer: Language Models Can Teach Themselves to Use Toolscited by 4,072
  10. 2017Deep reinforcement learning from human preferencescited by 3,846
  11. 2025Gemini 2.5: Pushing the Frontier with Advanced Reasoning, Multimodality, Long Context, and Next Generation Agentic Capabilitiescited by 3,655
  12. 2022Training a Helpful and Harmless Assistant with Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedbackcited by 3,634
34 more
  1. 2025DAPO: An Open-Source LLM Reinforcement Learning System at Scalecited by 2,678
  2. 2023WebArena: A Realistic Web Environment for Building Autonomous Agentscited by 1,908
  3. 2023MetaGPT: Meta Programming for A Multi-Agent Collaborative Frameworkcited by 1,761
  4. 2025Search-R1: Training LLMs to Reason and Leverage Search Engines with Reinforcement Learningcited by 1,371
  5. 2023Mind2Web: Towards a Generalist Agent for the Webcited by 1,210
  6. 2022WebShop: Towards Scalable Real-World Web Interaction with Grounded Language Agentscited by 1,197
  7. 2020ALFWorld: Aligning Text and Embodied Environments for Interactive Learningcited by 1,143
  8. 2024OSWorld: Benchmarking Multimodal Agents for Open-Ended Tasks in Real Computer Environmentscited by 1,134
  9. 2023GAIA: a benchmark for General AI Assistantscited by 1,084
  10. 2024SimPO: Simple Preference Optimization with a Reference-Free Rewardcited by 951
  11. 2019ALFRED: A Benchmark for Interpreting Grounded Instructions for Everyday Taskscited by 773
  12. 2025DeepSeek-V3.2: Pushing the Frontier of Open Large Language Modelscited by 755
  13. 2019Advantage-Weighted Regression: Simple and Scalable Off-Policy Reinforcement Learningcited by 750
  14. 2023Language Agent Tree Search Unifies Reasoning Acting and Planning in Language Modelscited by 551
  15. 2024Executable Code Actions Elicit Better LLM Agentscited by 537
  16. 2024Understanding the planning of LLM agents: A surveycited by 414
  17. 2025Agent Laboratory: Using LLM Agents as Research Assistantscited by 405
  18. 2024AppWorld: A Controllable World of Apps and People for Benchmarking Interactive Coding Agentscited by 359
  19. 2025DeepSeek-Prover-V2: Advancing Formal Mathematical Reasoning via Reinforcement Learning for Subgoal Decompositioncited by 270
  20. 2025MemAgent: Reshaping Long-Context LLM with Multi-Conv RL-based Memory Agentcited by 235
  21. 2025Large Language Model Agent: A Survey on Methodology, Applications and Challengescited by 194
  22. 2025From LLM Reasoning to Autonomous AI Agents: A Comprehensive Reviewcited by 146
  23. 2025Reinforcement Learning Optimization for Large-Scale Learning: An Efficient and User-Friendly Scaling Librarycited by 94
  24. 2025Soft Adaptive Policy Optimizationcited by 89
  25. 2025StepSearch: Igniting LLMs Search Ability via Step-Wise Proximal Policy Optimizationcited by 82
  26. 2024AgentGen: Enhancing Planning Abilities for Large Language Model based Agent via Environment and Task Generationcited by 80
  27. 2024Process Reward Model with Q-Value Rankingscited by 78
  28. 2015Language Understanding for Text-based Games Using Deep Reinforcement Learningcited by 70
  29. 2021DouZero: Mastering DouDizhu with Self-Play Deep Reinforcement Learningcited by 65
  30. 2026Qwen3-Coder-Next Technical Reportcited by 60
  31. 2018Playing Text-Adventure Games with Graph-Based Deep Reinforcement Learningcited by 53
  32. 2024WPO: Enhancing RLHF with Weighted Preference Optimizationcited by 53
  33. 2025DreamPRM: Domain-Reweighted Process Reward Model for Multimodal Reasoningcited by 15
  34. 2025More Bang for the Buck: Process Reward Modeling with Entropy-Driven Uncertaintycited by 10

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Cited by year (2026 to 7 Oct)

Citing papers per year: 2026: 7.

7 papers.

Similar, not cited

Close in wording, no citation either way

  1. 2026Beyond Trajectory-Level Attribution: Graph-Based Credit Assignment for Agentic Reinforcement Learning
  2. 2026Hierarchy-of-Groups Policy Optimization for Long-Horizon Agentic Tasks
  3. 2026Progress- and Reliability-Oriented Group Policy Optimization for Agentic Reinforcement Learning
  4. 2025Graph-Enhanced Policy Optimization in LLM Agent Training
  5. 2026Progress-conditioned Group Policy Optimization for Long-Horizon Agentic Tasks
  6. 2026Back to the Definition: Estimating Step-Level Advantages via Trajectory Graphs for Agentic Reinforcement Learning
  7. 2026PlanPO: Group Planning-Aware Policy Optimization for Multi-Turn Agentic LLMs
  8. 2025Tree Search for LLM Agent Reinforcement Learning