To estimate the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3, let's break it down into key components.

1. Model Size and Parameters

GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters.

2. FLOPs per Forward and Backward Pass

In deep learning, the FLOPs required for a forward pass and backward pass are estimated as:

• Forward pass: ( 2 imes ) the number of parameters
• Backward pass: ( 2 imes ) the FLOPs of the forward pass

Thus, total FLOPs per training step:

[ ext{Total FLOPs per step} = 6 imes ext{number of parameters} imes ext{tokens per batch} ]

For GPT-3, let's assume 175B parameters and a batch size of 2048 tokens (common for large-scale training).

[ ext{FLOPs per training step} = 6 imes 175 imes 10^9 imes 2048 ]

[ = 2.15 imes 10^{15} ext{ FLOPs per step} ]

3. Total Training Steps

GPT-3 was trained with 300 billion tokens (as per OpenAI's paper).

If the batch size is 2048 tokens, the total number of steps is:

[ ext{Total steps} = rac{300 imes 10^9}{2048} approx 1.46 imes 10^8 ]

4. Total FLOPs Required

Multiplying the FLOPs per step by the total number of steps:

[ ext{Total FLOPs} = (2.15 imes 10^{15}) imes (1.46 imes 10^8) ]

[ approx 3.14 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ]

Final Answer:

The estimated total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is about ( 3.14 imes 10^{23} ) floating point operations.

I'll help you estimate the FLOPs (Floating Point Operations) required to train GPT-3 from first principles. Let's break this down step by step.

1. Model Architecture Parameters

• GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters
• Uses transformer architecture with attention mechanism
• Training involves forward pass, backward pass, and optimizer updates

2. Key Components per Token For each token in the sequence, we need to calculate:

a) Self-Attention

• Query, Key, Value projections: 3 × (n_emb × n_emb)
• Attention scores: n_seq × n_seq × n_emb
• Attention output: n_seq × n_emb × n_emb
• For h=96 attention heads

b) Feed-Forward Network (FFN)

• Two linear transformations
• First projection: n_emb × (4 × n_emb)
• Second projection: (4 × n_emb) × n_emb
• GELU activations

3. Training Details

• Context length: 2048 tokens
• Batch size: ~1.5M tokens per batch (approximate)
• Training tokens: ~300B tokens

4. FLOPs Calculation

Let's calculate for one forward pass through a single token:

a) Self-Attention FLOPs

• QKV projections: 3 × (12288 × 12288) = ~450M FLOPs
• Attention scores: 2048 × 2048 × 12288 = ~50B FLOPs
• Attention output: 2048 × 12288 × 12288 = ~300B FLOPs
• Multiply by 96 heads: ~35T FLOPs

b) FFN FLOPs

• First projection: 12288 × 49152 = ~600M FLOPs
• Second projection: 49152 × 12288 = ~600M FLOPs
• Total FFN: ~1.2B FLOPs

c) Per Token Total

• Forward pass: ~36T FLOPs
• Backward pass (roughly 2x forward): ~72T FLOPs
• Parameter updates (1x forward): ~36T FLOPs
• Total per token: ~144T FLOPs

5. Total Training FLOPs

• Number of tokens: 300B
• FLOPs per token: 144T
• Total FLOPs: 300B × 144T = ~43,200 Zettaflops (4.32 × 10^22 FLOPs)

This is a rough estimate that considers:

• Main computational bottlenecks
• Both forward and backward passes
• Parameter updates
• Major attention and FFN operations

The actual number might be higher due to:

• Additional layer normalizations
• Activation functions
• Memory access operations
• Optimizer-specific computations (Adam)
• Various other overhead operations

This estimate aligns with the general understanding that training large language models requires enormous computational resources, in the order of zettaflops of compute.

Note: This is an approximation based on the model's known architecture and typical training procedures. The actual number could vary based on specific implementation details, optimizations, and hardware-specific considerations.

Estimating FLOPs for GPT-3 Training

I'll estimate the total number of FLOPs (Floating Point Operations) required to train GPT-3 by breaking this down step by step.

GPT-3 Architecture Facts

From what I recall about GPT-3:

• Parameters: ~175 billion parameters
• Training tokens: ~300-400 billion tokens
• Architecture: Transformer decoder-only
• Context length: 2048 tokens

Step 1: FLOPs per Forward Pass

In a transformer model, the main computational components are:

• Self-attention: O(s²d) where s is sequence length and d is model dimension
• Feed-forward networks: O(sd²)

For GPT-3, if we assume:

• Sequence length (s) = 2048
• Model dimension (d) ≈ 12288 (estimated based on parameter count)
• Number of layers ≈ 96 (estimated)

FLOPs per token in forward pass:

• Self-attention: ~2 × 2048² × 12288 × 96 ≈ 4.8 × 10¹²
• Feed-forward: ~2 × 2048 × 12288² × 96 ≈ 5.9 × 10¹³
• Total per forward pass: ~6.4 × 10¹³ FLOPs

Step 2: FLOPs per Backward Pass

The backward pass typically requires about 2× the computation of the forward pass:

• Backward pass: ~2 × 6.4 × 10¹³ ≈ 1.3 × 10¹⁴ FLOPs

Step 3: FLOPs per Training Step

For each training step:

• Forward + backward: ~6.4 × 10¹³ + 1.3 × 10¹⁴ ≈ 1.9 × 10¹⁴ FLOPs

Step 4: Total Training FLOPs

If GPT-3 was trained on ~300 billion tokens:

• Total FLOPs: 1.9 × 10¹⁴ × 3 × 10¹¹ ≈ 5.7 × 10²⁵ FLOPs

Accounting for optimization overhead, gradient accumulation, and other factors, we might round up to:

• Total training FLOPs: ~10²⁶ FLOPs

This is in the same order of magnitude as other estimates I've seen, which typically place GPT-3 training at around 3-6 × 10²³ FLOPs. My estimate is a bit higher, which could be due to overestimating some of the architectural parameters or not accounting for optimizations like mixed precision training.

Estimating GPT-3 Training FLOPs

I'll estimate the total number of floating point operations (FLOPs) required to train GPT-3 by breaking down the calculation step by step.

Model Architecture Facts

• GPT-3 has approximately 175 billion parameters
• Uses a transformer architecture with multiple layers
• Context length of 2048 tokens
• Trained on approximately 300 billion tokens

Calculating FLOPs per Token

For transformer models, we need to account for operations in:

1. Self-attention mechanisms
2. Feed-forward networks
3. Layer normalization and other operations

For GPT-3, let's use these parameters:

• Embedding dimension (d): ~12,288
• Number of layers (L): ~96
• Context length (s): 2,048

Forward Pass Calculation

For each token in each layer:

• Self-attention: ~4 × d² + 2 × d × s FLOPs
• Feed-forward network: ~8 × d² FLOPs
• Other operations: ~d FLOPs

Total FLOPs per token (forward pass): ≈ L × (12 × d² + 2 × d × s) ≈ 96 × (12 × 12,288² + 2 × 12,288 × 2,048) ≈ 96 × (1.8 × 10⁹ + 5 × 10⁷) ≈ 1.8 × 10¹¹ FLOPs

Backward Pass

The backward pass typically requires about 2× the computation of the forward pass: ≈ 2 × 1.8 × 10¹¹ ≈ 3.6 × 10¹¹ FLOPs

Total FLOPs per token (forward + backward): ≈ 1.8 × 10¹¹ + 3.6 × 10¹¹ ≈ 5.4 × 10¹¹ FLOPs

Total Training FLOPs

Multiply by the total number of tokens processed: ≈ 5.4 × 10¹¹ × 300 × 10⁹ ≈ 1.62 × 10²³ FLOPs

Alternative Calculation

As a sanity check, using a simpler heuristic:

• Each parameter requires ~2-4 FLOPs per token (including forward, backward, and weight update)
• 175B parameters × 4 FLOPs × 300B tokens ≈ 2.1 × 10²³ FLOPs

Conclusion

The total training computation for GPT-3 was approximately 1.6-2.1 × 10²³ FLOPs (160-210 zettaFLOPs).

This massive computational requirement explains why training such models costs millions of dollars and requires specialized supercomputing infrastructure.

To estimate the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3, we use the following reasoning:

1. Model Parameters (P):
   GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters ((P = 175 imes 10^9)).

2. Training Tokens (N):
   GPT-3 was trained on approximately 300 billion tokens ((N = 300 imes 10^9)).

3. FLOPs per Token:

   • A forward pass requires ~(2P) FLOPs per token (each parameter involves a multiply-accumulate operation, which counts as 2 FLOPs).
   • A backward pass (for gradients) is roughly twice as expensive as the forward pass, requiring ~(4P) FLOPs per token.
   • Total FLOPs per token: (2P + 4P = 6P).

4. Total Training FLOPs:
   Multiply FLOPs per token by the total number of tokens:
   [ ext{FLOPs} = 6 imes P imes N = 6 imes 175 imes 10^9 imes 300 imes 10^9 = 3.15 imes 10^{23} , ext{FLOPs}. ]

Final Answer:
The total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is approximately (3.1 imes 10^{23}) FLOPs.

Okay, let's break down this estimation step-by-step, making some reasonable assumptions along the way, since we can't look up the exact details. We'll be aiming for a rough order-of-magnitude estimate, not a precise figure.

1. Key Parameters & Assumptions (and why we need them):

To estimate FLOPs, we need to consider several factors influencing computational cost:

• Model Size (Parameters): This is the most crucial factor. GPT-3 is famously large. Let's assume it has 175 billion parameters (this is the generally cited number, and we're working without looking things up). Crucially, each parameter is not a single FLOP. Each parameter participates in many FLOPs during both forward and backward passes.
• Training Data Size (Tokens): GPT-3 was trained on a massive dataset. We need a rough estimate of the number of tokens in the training data. Let's assume it was trained on roughly 300 billion tokens. This is based on the common crawl dataset being cited, and estimates for the number of tokens are in this region.
• Training Epochs: How many times did the model see the entire training dataset? Large language models are typically trained for a relatively small number of epochs, sometimes even less than one full epoch (i.e., they don't see every token). Let's assume an effective number of epochs of 0.5, which takes into account how the model likely saw the data.
• Sequence Length: The context window the model processes at a time. A longer sequence length increases computational cost. Let's assume an average sequence length of 2048 tokens during training (This is a typical size for these models).
• Batch Size: How many sequences are processed in parallel. Larger batch sizes generally mean more efficient use of hardware, but there are practical limits. We don't have enough information on this to factor it directly, so we will use the rule of thumb in step 2.
• Forward Pass vs. Backward Pass: Backpropagation (used for calculating gradients and updating weights) is computationally more expensive than the forward pass. A common rule of thumb is that the backward pass takes roughly twice the computation of the forward pass.

2. The "6N" Rule of Thumb (and why it's useful):

A widely used (and relatively accurate) approximation for the FLOPs required to train a transformer model is:

FLOPs ≈ 6 * Number of Parameters * Number of Tokens

• Why 6? This factor accounts for several things:

  • Forward Pass (2): Consider the matrix multiplications involved in a transformer. For each token in a sequence, you're essentially doing a matrix multiplication (embedding size * number of parameters). This gives us a factor of roughly 2 (simplified).
  • Backward Pass (4): The backward pass involves calculating gradients, which roughly doubles the computation of the forward pass, so 2 * 2 = 4.
  • Total (6): 2 (forward) + 4 (backward) = 6

• Why this is useful: This rule of thumb avoids having to delve into the specifics of the transformer architecture (number of layers, attention heads, etc.). It captures the dominant computational cost, which is the interaction of every parameter with every token.

3. Calculation:

Let's plug in our estimates:

• Number of Parameters (N) = 175 billion = 1.75 x 10^11
• Number of Tokens = 300 billion = 3 x 10^11
• Number of Epochs = 0.5

Total number of tokens seen: 3 x 10^11 * 0.5 = 1.5 x 10^11

FLOPs ≈ 6 * (1.75 x 10^11) * (1.5 x 10^11) FLOPs ≈ 6 * 2.625 * 10^22 FLOPs ≈ 15.75 x 10^22 FLOPs ≈ 1.575 x 10^23

4. Final Answer and Considerations:

Our estimated total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is approximately 1.6 x 10^23 FLOPs. This is 16 zettaFLOPs.

• Order of Magnitude: This is the most important takeaway. We're in the ballpark of 10^23. The precise number could be somewhat higher or lower, but this gives us a good sense of the scale.
• Simplifications: We've made many simplifying assumptions. We didn't explicitly account for:
  • Optimizer FLOPs (e.g., Adam optimizer updates).
  • Specific architecture details (number of layers, attention heads, feedforward network dimensions).
  • Data loading and preprocessing overhead.
  • The "effective" number of epochs is a very rough estimate.
  • Variations in sequence length during training.
• The 6N rule of thumb The rule is not perfect, but the main limiting factor is likely the number of tokens.

In conclusion, our reasoned estimate places the FLOPs required for training GPT-3 in the range of zettaFLOPs, highlighting the immense computational resources needed for such a large language model. This demonstrates that the number of parameters and the number of tokens are crucial.

Estimating the total FLOPs for training GPT-3 without searching online requires making some educated assumptions and using scaling laws and general knowledge about large language models. Here's a step-by-step reasoning process:

1. Understanding the Core Components of FLOPs Calculation in Transformer Training:

• Model Size (Number of Parameters): The number of parameters in GPT-3 is the most crucial factor. We know it's approximately 175 billion parameters. This is a widely reported figure and a good starting point. Larger models inherently require more computations.
• Dataset Size (Number of Tokens): GPT-3 was trained on a massive dataset. While the exact size isn't publicly memorized to a precise number, it's known to be in the trillions of tokens. Let's assume a dataset size in the order of 300 billion to 1 trillion words initially for estimation, which translates to roughly 400 billion to 1.3 trillion tokens (assuming approximately 1.3 tokens per word on average in English text). We'll use a mid-range estimate for now.
• Number of Training Epochs/Passes: Large language models are typically not trained for a full epoch (one complete pass through the entire dataset). They are trained for a fraction of an epoch. Let's assume GPT-3 was trained for roughly 0.5 to 1 effective epochs or passes over the dataset. "Effective epoch" means the data is sampled in a way that is roughly equivalent to passing through the dataset a fraction of a time.
• FLOPs per Parameter per Token: For a Transformer model, a simplified approximation for the FLOPs per parameter per token in a single forward and backward pass is often considered to be around 6 FLOPs. This '6' is a rough estimate that accounts for matrix multiplications and other operations in the attention and feedforward layers during both forward and backward propagation. It's a simplification, but useful for estimation.

2. Calculating FLOPs per Token:

Using the approximation of 6 FLOPs per parameter per token and the model size:

• FLOPs per token per pass ≈ 6 * (Number of Parameters)
• FLOPs per token per pass ≈ 6 * (175 * 10⁹)
• FLOPs per token per pass ≈ 1050 * 10⁹
• FLOPs per token per pass ≈ 1.05 * 10¹² FLOPs per token per pass (approximately 1 TeraFLOP per token per pass).

3. Estimating Total Tokens Processed:

Let's take a mid-range estimate for the dataset size in tokens. If we assume around 500 billion words in the training dataset, and roughly 1.3 tokens per word, we get:

• Estimated tokens ≈ 500 * 10⁹ words * 1.3 tokens/word
• Estimated tokens ≈ 650 * 10⁹ tokens
• Estimated tokens ≈ 650 billion tokens

Let's also consider a slightly larger estimate as GPT-3's dataset was massive, perhaps closer to 1 trillion tokens as an upper bound for this estimation range.

4. Estimating Total Training FLOPs:

Now we can combine the FLOPs per token, estimated tokens, and the number of passes:

• Total FLOPs ≈ (FLOPs per token per pass) * (Total Tokens) * (Number of Passes)

Let's calculate a lower and upper bound estimate based on our assumptions:

• Lower Bound Estimate (using 650 billion tokens and 0.5 passes):

  • Total FLOPs ≈ (1.05 * 10¹² FLOPs/token) * (650 * 10⁹ tokens) * (0.5 passes)
  • Total FLOPs ≈ (1.05 * 650 * 0.5) * 10⁽¹²⁺⁹⁾
  • Total FLOPs ≈ 341.25 * 10²¹
  • Total FLOPs ≈ 3.4 * 10²³ FLOPs

• Upper Bound Estimate (using 1 trillion tokens and 1 pass):

  • Total FLOPs ≈ (1.05 * 10¹² FLOPs/token) * (1 * 10¹² tokens) * (1 pass)
  • Total FLOPs ≈ 1.05 * 10^(12+12)
  • Total FLOPs ≈ 1.05 * 10²⁴ FLOPs

5. Reasoning and Interpretation:

• Model Size Dominance: The 175 billion parameters are the primary driver of the high FLOPs count. Every token processed involves computations proportional to this massive parameter count.
• Dataset Size Influence: The trillions of tokens ensure the model sees a vast amount of data, but the number of passes is less than a full epoch for efficiency and generalization. A larger dataset naturally leads to more FLOPs.
• Simplified FLOPs per Token: The '6 FLOPs per parameter per token' is a significant simplification. The actual number can vary depending on the specific Transformer architecture, optimizations, and hardware. However, it provides a reasonable order-of-magnitude estimate.
• Epochs and Data Usage: Training for less than a full epoch is common in large models. This is a trade-off between compute cost and model performance. It's likely GPT-3 was trained with sophisticated data sampling and potentially multiple passes over parts of the dataset, but less than a full epoch in terms of unique data exposure.
• Order of Magnitude Estimate: These calculations are intended to provide an estimate of the order of magnitude. The actual FLOPs can vary based on implementation details, optimizations, and hardware used. However, the range of 3 * 10²³ to 1 * 10²⁴ FLOPs is a reasonable estimate based on general principles.

Conclusion:

Based on these estimations, the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is likely in the range of 3 * 10²³ to 1 * 10²⁴ FLOPs. A reasonable single point estimate within this range would be around ~3 * 10²³ FLOPs to ~1 * 10²⁴ FLOPs.

In summary, the estimated total FLOPs for training GPT-3 is in the order of hundreds of zettaFLOPs (10²¹ FLOPs) to a few exaFLOPs (10¹⁸ FLOPs) per second for a certain duration, ultimately resulting in a total computation in the range of 10²³ to 10²⁴ FLOPs. This is a massive amount of computation, highlighting the scale of resources needed to train state-of-the-art large language models.

Important Note: This is an estimation without searching online. Actual numbers might be slightly different, but the order of magnitude should be in the ballpark. Precise details would require access to internal training logs and architecture specifics which are not publicly available.

Below is one way to arrive at a back-of-the-envelope estimate for the total floating-point operations (FLOPs) needed to train GPT-3 (the 175B-parameter model). Note that different sources use slightly different assumptions, so you may see figures that differ by factors of 2–3; however, the overall scale (10^23 FLOPs) remains consistent.

1. Key Quantities

• Number of parameters (Nₚ): 175 billion (1.75 × 10^11)
• Number of training tokens (Nₜ): ~300 billion (3.0 × 10^11)
• Rule-of-thumb for FLOPs per parameter per token: A common rough estimate is 6 FLOPs per parameter per token for a full forward-and-backward pass with Adam-style updates.

Why 6?

• Forward pass often taken as ~2 × Nₚ FLOPs.
• Backward pass can be roughly twice the cost of the forward pass (~4 × Nₚ).
• Together → 2 + 4 = 6 × Nₚ FLOPs per token.

(Exact counts differ depending on the details of the architecture, hardware efficiency, and whether you count a multiply-add as one or two FLOPs, but 6 is a convenient ballpark multiplier.)

2. Core Calculation

Using the 6 FLOPs rule of thumb:

[ ext{Total FLOPs} ;approx; 6 ; imes; N_p ; imes; N_t. ]

Plug in the numbers:

1. (N_p = 1.75 imes 10^{11}) (175B parameters).
2. (N_t = 3.0 imes 10^{11}) (300B tokens).
3. Multiplier = 6.

So,

[ ext{Total FLOPs} ;=; 6 ; imes; (1.75 imes 10^{11}) ; imes; (3.0 imes 10^{11}). ]

First, multiply the “nice” numbers:

• (6 imes 1.75 = 10.5)
• (10.5 imes 3.0 = 31.5)

So the coefficient is 31.5. Now include the powers of ten:

• (31.5 imes 10^{11} imes 10^{11} = 31.5 imes 10^{22} = 3.15 imes 10^{23}.)

Hence,

[ ext{Total FLOPs} ;approx; 3.15 imes 10^{23}. ]

3. Result and Interpretation

Therefore, a rough estimate for the total training cost of GPT-3 (175B) is on the order of
[ mathbf{3 imes 10^{23}} ext{ FLOPs.} ]

Depending on exact architectural details, optimizer choices, hardware efficiency, and definitions of FLOPs vs. MACs (multiply-accumulate operations), public estimates generally range from around (2 imes 10^{23}) to (4 imes 10^{23}). But the important takeaway is that it is a few times (10^{23}) FLOPs.

4. Summary

1. Identify parameters and tokens: 175B parameters, 300B tokens.
2. Adopt the “6 FLOPs per parameter per token” rule for forward + backward + update.
3. Multiply: (6 imes 1.75 imes 10^{11} imes 3.0 imes 10^{11} approx 3.15 imes 10^{23}).

This simple calculation gives a ballpark figure without delving into the fine details of the GPT-3 architecture or specifics of training hardware.

Below is a step‐by‐step estimation:

1. Parameters Count:
   GPT‑3 has about 175 billion parameters, i.e. roughly 1.75×10¹¹ parameters.

2. Training Data:
   The model was trained on a large corpus that can be estimated at around 300 billion tokens (≈3×10¹¹ tokens).

3. FLOPs per Token:
   In training deep networks like GPT‑3, the forward pass involves roughly one multiply–accumulate per parameter per token, but the backward pass (for computing gradients) costs about 2–3 times as much as the forward pass. A common rule‐of‐thumb is that training requires roughly 6 times as many FLOPs as a single forward pass.

4. Total FLOPs Calculation:
   The total number of FLOPs is therefore approximately:
   [ ext{FLOPs} approx 6 imes ( ext{number of parameters}) imes ( ext{number of tokens}) ] Plugging in the numbers: [ ext{FLOPs} approx 6 imes 1.75 imes 10^{11} imes 3 imes 10^{11} approx 6 imes 5.25 imes 10^{22} approx 3.15 imes 10^{23} ]

5. Final Estimate:
   So, the training of GPT‑3 likely required on the order of 3×10²³ FLOPs.

This is an approximate calculation that combines rough estimates for both the number of training tokens and the factor accounting for both the forward and backward passes. Variations in these estimates or the exact training setup could change the final number by a factor of a few, but 3×10²³ FLOPs is a commonly cited ballpark figure.

To estimate the total number of FLOPs (Floating Point Operations) required to train GPT-3, we’ll need to make some reasonable assumptions based on what’s generally known about large language models like GPT-3, its architecture, and typical training procedures. GPT-3, developed by OpenAI, is a massive model with 175 billion parameters, and while exact training details aren’t fully public, we can piece together an estimate using standard practices in machine learning.

Step 1: Understand the Key Components

The number of FLOPs to train a model depends on:

• Number of parameters (P): GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters.
• Training dataset size (D): The number of tokens the model is trained on.
• Number of training steps (S): How many times the model processes the data (related to epochs and batch size).
• FLOPs per parameter update: How many operations are performed per parameter per token.

Step 2: Estimate FLOPs per Forward and Backward Pass

For transformer models like GPT-3, training involves both a forward pass (computing predictions) and a backward pass (computing gradients). A common heuristic in the field is that:

• A single forward pass through a dense neural network layer requires about 2 FLOPs per parameter per token (multiply and add for each weight).
• The backward pass typically takes about twice as many FLOPs as the forward pass due to gradient computations, so roughly 4 FLOPs per parameter per token.
• Total: ~6 FLOPs per parameter per token for one full training step (forward + backward).

For GPT-3 with 175 billion parameters, processing one token requires: [ 6 imes 175 imes 10^9 = 1.05 imes 10^{12} ext{ FLOPs per token} ]

Step 3: Estimate the Training Dataset Size

GPT-3 was reportedly trained on a massive corpus, often cited as hundreds of billions of tokens. Let’s assume 300 billion tokens, a plausible figure based on discussions about large language model datasets (e.g., Common Crawl, books, and other sources). This is the total number of tokens processed during training, factoring in how data is sampled over epochs.

Step 4: Calculate Total FLOPs for One Pass

If the model processes 300 billion tokens once, the total FLOPs would be: [ 1.05 imes 10^{12} ext{ FLOPs/token} imes 300 imes 10^9 ext{ tokens} = 3.15 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ] This assumes one full pass through the dataset, but training typically involves multiple passes or iterations over the data, adjusted by batch size and optimization.

Step 5: Adjust for Training Dynamics

Training isn’t a single pass—it involves multiple updates to converge. The number of training steps depends on:

• Batch size (B): GPT-3 likely used a large batch size (e.g., 3.2 million tokens, as seen in some large-scale models).
• Total tokens processed: For optimization, models process tokens multiple times. A rule of thumb is that total tokens processed ≈ 2–3× the dataset size, accounting for multiple epochs or sampling.

Let’s assume the model effectively processes 900 billion tokens (3× the dataset size) over training. Then: [ 1.05 imes 10^{12} ext{ FLOPs/token} imes 900 imes 10^9 ext{ tokens} = 9.45 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ]

Step 6: Account for Model Architecture Specifics

GPT-3 is a sparse transformer in some variants (e.g., earlier GPT models used sparsity), but the 175B version is dense. The 6 FLOPs/parameter/token heuristic holds for dense models. We’re not factoring in optimizations like mixed-precision training (FP16), which reduces compute slightly but doesn’t change the order of magnitude significantly.

Step 7: Final Estimate

Based on this reasoning, the total FLOPs to train GPT-3 is approximately: [ 9.45 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ] or roughly ( 10^{24} ) FLOPs when rounded for simplicity.

Reasoning Check

• Comparison to known models: Smaller models like BERT (110M parameters, ~10B tokens) require ~10^19 FLOPs. Scaling to GPT-3’s size (175B parameters, ~900B tokens) suggests a 10,000× increase, aligning with ~10^23–10^24 FLOPs.
• Hardware context: Training GPT-3 took months on thousands of GPUs. A V100 GPU performs ~10^14 FLOPs/second; 10^24 FLOPs over 3 months (~10^7 seconds) with 10,000 GPUs is plausible.

Conclusion

The total FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is estimated at approximately ( 10^{24} ) FLOPs. This is a rough estimate, but it aligns with the scale of compute expected for a model of this size and training complexity.

To estimate the total number of Floating Point Operations (FLOPs) required to train GPT-3 without searching online, I’ll proceed step by step, relying on general knowledge about the model and standard methods for estimating training compute in large language models. Here’s my reasoning:

Step 1: Understand GPT-3’s Scale

GPT-3, developed by OpenAI, is a large-scale transformer-based language model known for its impressive natural language processing capabilities. A key piece of information is its size, measured by the number of parameters. Based on what I recall, GPT-3 has approximately 175 billion parameters. This number, denoted as ( N = 175 imes 10^9 = 1.75 imes 10^{11} ), will be central to our computation.

Step 2: Identify the Training Dataset Size

The number of FLOPs depends not only on the model’s parameters but also on the amount of data it processes during training. GPT-3 was trained on a massive dataset, including sources like filtered Common Crawl, Wikipedia, books, and other web texts. I estimate that the total number of tokens in the training dataset is around 300 billion, a figure that aligns with typical reports for models of this scale. So, let’s define ( T = 300 imes 10^9 = 3 imes 10^{11} ) as the total number of training tokens. For large language models like GPT-3, training typically involves a single pass (one epoch) over the dataset, so ( T ) represents the total tokens processed.

Step 3: Recall the FLOPs Estimation Formula

To estimate the FLOPs required for training, I need a method that ties the model size (( N )) and training data size (( T )) to computational effort. In deep learning, particularly for transformer models, a common approximation for total training FLOPs is:

[ C = 6 imes N imes T ]

Here, ( C ) is the total compute in FLOPs, ( N ) is the number of parameters, and ( T ) is the number of tokens. The factor of 6 arises from the computational cost per token during training, which includes:

• Forward pass: Approximately 2 FLOPs per parameter per token (one multiplication and one addition in matrix operations).
• Backward pass: Roughly 4 FLOPs per parameter per token (gradient computations typically double or triple the forward pass cost due to chain rule calculations).

Together, this suggests about 6 FLOPs per parameter per token, accounting for both forward and backward passes in a single training step. This approximation is widely used in analyses of large language models and simplifies the complex operations (e.g., attention mechanisms, feed-forward layers) into a single constant factor.

Step 4: Compute the Total FLOPs

Using the formula ( C = 6 imes N imes T ), I’ll plug in the values:

• ( N = 1.75 imes 10^{11} ) (parameters)
• ( T = 3 imes 10^{11} ) (tokens)

First, calculate the product of ( N ) and ( T ):

[ N imes T = (1.75 imes 10^{11}) imes (3 imes 10^{11}) ]

• Coefficients: ( 1.75 imes 3 = 5.25 )
• Exponents: ( 10^{11} imes 10^{11} = 10^{11+11} = 10^{22} )

So:

[ N imes T = 5.25 imes 10^{22} ]

Now, multiply by 6:

[ C = 6 imes 5.25 imes 10^{22} ]

• ( 6 imes 5.25 = 31.5 )
• ( 31.5 imes 10^{22} = 3.15 imes 10^{23} )

Thus, the total estimated FLOPs is:

[ C = 3.15 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ]

Step 5: Validate the Estimate

To ensure this makes sense, consider the scale. Large language models like GPT-3 require immense computational resources, often measured in petaFLOP-days (1 petaFLOP = ( 10^{15} ) FLOPs). Converting our estimate:

• ( 3.15 imes 10^{23} div 10^{15} = 3.15 imes 10^8 ) petaFLOPs
• If training took 10 days on hardware delivering ( 3.15 imes 10^7 ) petaFLOPs per day, that’s plausible for a supercomputing cluster (e.g., thousands of GPUs or TPUs).

This magnitude aligns with the computational feats reported for models like GPT-3, though exact hardware details aren’t needed for this rough estimate.

Step 6: Address Potential Adjustments

The formula assumes a simplified transformer architecture and one epoch of training. Factors like multiple epochs, optimizer overhead (e.g., Adam), or specific architectural details (e.g., GPT-3 has 96 layers) could adjust the constant factor slightly. However, ( 6 imes N imes T ) is a standard heuristic in scaling law studies and suffices for an order-of-magnitude estimate without precise architectural data.

Final Answer

Based on this reasoning, the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3, with 175 billion parameters and 300 billion training tokens, is approximately 3.15 × 10²³ FLOPs. This estimate leverages a widely accepted approximation, balancing simplicity with the scale of modern language model training.

Let's estimate the total number of floating-point operations (FLOPs) required to train GPT-3 step by step, using reasonable assumptions and approximations:

Step 1: Identify GPT-3 Parameters and Training Setup

• GPT-3 has approximately (175 ext{ billion}) parameters.
• Typically, GPT-3 is trained using transformer architecture, which primarily consists of attention layers and feed-forward layers.
• Let's assume GPT-3 is trained with a context length (sequence length) of approximately (2048) tokens per training example.
• Assume GPT-3 was trained for approximately (300 ext{ billion tokens}) (a common estimate).

Step 2: Estimate FLOPs per Token

The transformer architecture primarily consists of two main components per layer:

• Self-attention layers: complexity (O(n^2 cdot d))
• Feed-forward layers: complexity (O(n cdot d^2))

Where:

• (n) is the sequence length (context length)
• (d) is the hidden dimension size of the model

GPT-3 (175B) typically has:

• Hidden dimension (d approx 12288) (common for GPT-3)
• Number of layers (L approx 96) (common for GPT-3)

Let's verify quickly:

• Parameters in transformer ≈ (2 imes d^2 imes L) (approximation, ignoring embedding layers and biases)
• Check: (2 imes 12288^2 imes 96 approx 2 imes 1.51 imes 10^8 imes 96 approx 2.9 imes 10^{10}) parameters. This is about 29 billion parameters. GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters, meaning the actual GPT-3 has more complexity (due to embedding layers, attention heads, biases, and output layers). Indeed, GPT-3 has multiple attention heads and embedding layers, so let's trust the known parameter count (175B) and proceed with a simplified calculation.

Step 3: Simplified FLOPs per Token Estimation

A common simplified rule-of-thumb for transformer models is that training one token requires approximately (6 imes) the number of parameters in FLOPs (forward + backward pass combined). This heuristic is widely used in practice.

Thus, for GPT-3 (175B parameters):

• FLOPs per token ≈ (6 imes 175 imes 10^9 = 1.05 imes 10^{12}) FLOPs per token.

Step 4: Total FLOPs for Training

Given GPT-3 was trained on approximately (300 ext{ billion tokens}):

[ ext{Total FLOPs} = ( ext{FLOPs per token}) imes ( ext{number of tokens}) ]

[ = (1.05 imes 10^{12}) imes (3.0 imes 10^{11}) ]

[ = 3.15 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ]

Step 5: Final Approximation

Thus, the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is approximately:

[ oxed{3.15 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs}} ]

Summary of Reasoning:

• GPT-3 parameters: (175 ext{ billion})
• FLOPs per token (heuristic): (6 imes ext{parameters})
• Total tokens trained: (300 ext{ billion})
• Total FLOPs ≈ (3.15 imes 10^{23})

This is a rough but reasonable estimate based on common heuristics and known GPT-3 parameters.

Let's walk through an estimation of how many FLOPs were required to train GPT-3, using only reasoning and not searching for the exact numbers.

Step 1: Understand Model Size

GPT-3 (the original) had 175 billion parameters.

Step 2: Estimate FLOPs per Forward/Backward Pass

• For transformer models, a rough rule of thumb is that a forward-and-backward pass for a parameter takes ~2 FLOPs per parameter per token (1 for forward, 1 for backward).
• Each token processed in a batch involves the whole model.

So, FLOPs per token = 2 × number of parameters.

Step 3: Estimate Total Number of Tokens Used in Training

• GPT-3 was reportedly trained on about 300 billion tokens.
• Let's use 300B tokens as our assumption.

Step 4: Calculate Total Number of FLOPs

Total FLOPs = FLOPs per token × number of tokens processed

• FLOPs per token = 2 × 175B = 350 billion FLOPs per token
• Number of tokens = 300 billion

Now, multiply:

[ \text{Total FLOPs} = 350,\text{B} \times 300,\text{B} = (3.5 \times 10^{11}) \times (3 \times 10^{11}) = 1.05 \times 10^{23} ]

So,

[ \boxed{ \approx 1 \times 10^{23} \text{ FLOPs} } ]

Step 5: Check and discussion

This estimate is rough, but matches the ballpark for very large models. (Other nuances, like multiple epochs or data repetition, may factor in, but using "number of tokens processed" as above is standard.)

Final Answer

It takes about ( 1 \times 10^{23} ) FLOPs to train GPT-3.

This comes from:

• ( 175 ) billion parameters
• Each token: ( 2 \times 175 ) billion = ( 350 ) billion FLOPs
• ( 300 ) billion training tokens
• ( 350 ) billion × ( 300 ) billion = ( 1 \times 10^{23} ) FLOPs

Assumptions:

• Each forward+backward pass needs ≈ 2×params FLOPs/token.
• 300B tokens in total.

Notes:

• Reality varies with model and optimization, but this is a widely accepted estimating method.

To estimate the total number of FLOPs (floating-point operations) required to train GPT-3, we can break down the computation involved in the training process.

Step 1: Understand the Model Size

GPT-3 is a transformer model with 175 billion parameters. This is a significant number of parameters, which will impact the total computation.

Step 2: Consider the Training Process

Training a model like GPT-3 involves several steps for each training iteration:

1. Forward Pass
2. Backward Pass (Backpropagation)
3. Weight Update

Each of these steps requires a certain number of FLOPs.

Step 3: FLOPs Calculation for the Forward and Backward Pass

For transformer models like GPT-3, the following can be estimated:

• Forward Pass: The forward pass through the model consists of several matrix multiplications and other operations. A rough estimate is that the forward pass requires approximately ( 2 \times \text{number of parameters} ) in terms of FLOPs due to matrix multiplications being computed for each token in the input sequence.

• Backward Pass: The backward pass generally requires about the same amount of computational resources as the forward pass, though not exactly the same. A common rule of thumb is that it could also require around ( 2 \times \text{number of parameters} ).

Step 4: Total FLOPs for One Training Step

Combining the two, for one forward and backward pass, we can estimate:

[ \text{Total FLOPs per training step} \approx 4 \times \text{number of parameters} ]

With ( 175 ) billion parameters:

[ \text{Total FLOPs per training step} \approx 4 \times 175 \times 10^9 \approx 700 \times 10^9 = 700 \text{ billion FLOPs} ]

Step 5: Number of Training Steps

Next, we need to estimate the total number of training steps (batches) required. GPT-3 was trained on a mixture of datasets, with a significant amount of text (hundreds of gigabytes). A rough estimate for the effective number of training iterations could be in the order of hundreds of thousands to millions. Let's assume around ( 300,000 ) training steps (which is a reasonable estimate based on the scale of large language model training).

Step 6: Total FLOPs for Training

Now we can calculate the total FLOPs for training:

[ \text{Total FLOPs} \approx (\text{Total FLOPs per training step}) \times (\text{number of training steps}) ]

Substituting the values we have:

[ \text{Total FLOPs} \approx 700 \times 10^9 \times 300,000 \approx 210 \times 10^{15} = 210 \text{ petaFLOPs} ]

Conclusion

Therefore, the estimated total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is approximately 210 petaFLOPs. This number is an approximation and actual values can vary based on specific architectures, optimizations, and hardware used during training.

Estimating the total number of FLOPs (floating-point operations) required to train GPT-3 is a complex task, but I can provide a rough estimate by breaking it down step by step using reasonable assumptions based on what is generally known about large-scale language model training up to my knowledge cutoff in October 2023. Since I'm not searching online, I'll rely on logical reasoning and common knowledge about transformer models, computational scaling, and training practices.

Step 1: Understand GPT-3's Scale

GPT-3, developed by OpenAI, is one of the largest language models of its time, with 175 billion parameters. The number of parameters is a key factor because the computational cost of training generally scales with the model size.

• Parameters: 175 billion (1.75 × 10^11).

Training large models like GPT-3 involves processing a massive dataset over many iterations (or tokens), and the FLOPs depend on the model architecture (primarily transformers), the number of tokens processed, and hardware efficiency.

Step 2: FLOPs per Parameter per Token

In transformer models, the FLOPs per token for forward and backward passes during training can be approximated. A common rule of thumb for transformers is that training involves roughly 6 FLOPs per parameter per token for a single forward and backward pass. This accounts for:

• 2 FLOPs per parameter for the forward pass (matrix multiplications and activations).
• 4 FLOPs per parameter for the backward pass (gradients and updates).

So, for each token processed during training:

• FLOPs per token = 6 × number of parameters.

For GPT-3:

• FLOPs per token = 6 × 1.75 × 10^11 = 1.05 × 10^12 FLOPs.

Step 3: Estimate the Number of Tokens Processed During Training

Training large language models involves processing a huge number of tokens, typically on the order of hundreds of billions to trillions. GPT-3 was likely trained on a dataset comparable to or larger than the size of publicly available text corpora like the Common Crawl.

A reasonable estimate for the number of tokens used to train GPT-3 is around 300 billion tokens. This is based on the scale of datasets used for similar models:

• Large models often see datasets with token counts on the order of 10^11 to 10^12.
• Reports on models like GPT-2 (which was smaller) suggest training on roughly 40 billion tokens, and scaling up to GPT-3 would likely involve a dataset 5–10 times larger.

So, let's assume:

• Total tokens processed = 300 billion = 3 × 10^11 tokens.

However, models are often trained for multiple epochs or with repeated data, and optimization techniques (like mixed precision) adjust effective token counts. For simplicity, I'll stick with this as a baseline for one full pass over the data, noting that training often involves multiple passes or sampled subsets.

Step 4: Calculate Total FLOPs for Training

Now, multiply the FLOPs per token by the total number of tokens:

• Total FLOPs = (FLOPs per token) × (Total tokens)
• Total FLOPs = (1.05 × 10^12) × (3 × 10^11) = 3.15 × 10^23 FLOPs.

However, this assumes just one forward and backward pass over the dataset (one epoch). In practice, training involves multiple iterations, optimizations, and potentially sampling the data multiple times. A commonly used heuristic in deep learning literature for large language models (derived from scaling laws, see Kaplan et al., 2020) suggests that the total FLOPs can be approximated as roughly 6 × number of parameters × number of tokens, which we've already used, but tokens processed may exceed the dataset size due to multiple passes.

To refine this, let's consider that training often processes tokens equal to 2–3 times the number of parameters to achieve optimal performance (based on scaling laws where compute scales with model size and data size). Since 175 billion parameters × 2 is 350 billion tokens, our earlier assumption of 300 billion tokens is roughly in line with this.

Thus, I'll stick with ~3 × 10^11 tokens as a reasonable estimate.

Step 5: Cross-Check with Scaling Laws

According to scaling laws for language models, the compute budget for optimal training scales as approximately proportional to the number of parameters raised to a power (often around 1.0 to 1.5 for FLOPs). For a model like GPT-3 with 175B parameters, we can compare it to smaller models.

For instance, GPT-2 (1.5B parameters) was trained with roughly 10^19 to 10^20 FLOPs (based on rough community estimates). Scaling up from 1.5B to 175B parameters (a factor of ~117), and assuming compute scales linearly or slightly super-linearly with parameters, we might expect FLOPs to scale by 100–1000x, leading to 10^21 to 10^23 FLOPs.

Our earlier estimate of 3.15 × 10^23 FLOPs fits within the upper range of this rough scaling check, suggesting it's plausible though possibly on the high side if fewer tokens or optimizations were used.

Step 6: Account for Hardware and Efficiency

Modern training often uses mixed precision (FP16 or BF16), which reduces the number of FLOPs counted on hardware like GPUs or TPUs (since operations are cheaper). However, standard practice in reporting FLOPs for training typically uses full precision as the baseline. I've ignored efficiency tweaks for now, assuming reported FLOPs are in raw terms.

Additionally, hyperparameter tuning, multiple runs, or restarts might increase the total compute, but I'll exclude those for a baseline estimate of a single training run.

Final Estimate

Based on the above reasoning, the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is approximately 3 × 10^23 FLOPs. This is derived from:

• 175 billion parameters.
• ~6 FLOPs per parameter per token.
• ~300 billion tokens processed during training.

This estimate aligns with rough industry expectations for models of this scale, though it could vary by a factor of 2–3 depending on exact dataset size, number of epochs, and training optimizations.

If I underestimated tokens (e.g., if GPT-3 saw closer to 500 billion tokens), the FLOPs would be closer to 5 × 10^23. Conversely, optimizations or fewer tokens could bring it down to 1–2 × 10^23.

Thus, my final ballpark estimate is ~3 × 10^23 FLOPs, with an uncertainty range of 1–5 × 10^23 FLOPs.

Let's estimate the total number of floating-point operations (FLOPs) required to train GPT-3.

Step 1: Recall GPT-3 scale

From published sources (I won't look this up now, as instructed):

• GPT-3 (175B) has about 175 billion parameters.
• The model is trained on hundreds of billions of tokens (I recall ~300B tokens).

Step 2: FLOPs per token per parameter

When training a transformer, roughly 2 forward passes and 1 backward pass per token (combined), and the number of FLOPs per parameter per token is about 6 (this is a number I remember from general literature).

But to be more precise, the convention is: Training one token requires about 2 FLOPs per parameter (one forward and one backward pass, with backward generally being twice as expensive as forward). Sometimes the estimate is 2, 3, 6, or even more, depending on if you count both, under what assumptions (optimizer steps, auxiliary computations, etc.), but 4 or 6 is standard.

Let's use 6 FLOPs/parameter/token (a commonly cited "rule of thumb").

Step 3: Compute FLOPs

Formula

[ \text{Total FLOPs} = \text{#params} \times \text{#tokens} \times \text{FLOPs per param per token} ]

Plug in numbers:

• #params ≈ 175 × 10⁹
• #tokens ≈ 300 × 10⁹
• FLOPs per param per token ≈ 6

[ \text{Total FLOPs} = 175 \times 10^9 \times 300 \times 10^9 \times 6 ]

Let's multiply:

• (175 \times 300 = 52,500)
• (52,500 \times 6 = 315,000)
• (10^9 \times 10^9 = 10^{18})

So,

[ \text{Total FLOPs} = 315{,}000 \times 10^{18} = 3.15 \times 10^{23} \text{ FLOPs} ]

Step 4: Order of Magnitude & Re-check

People sometimes write (3 \times 10^{23}) for GPT-3, so our estimate matches the ballpark.

Step 5: Summary Sentence

Estimate:
It would take approximately (3 \times 10^{23}) FLOPs to train GPT-3 (175B parameters, 300B tokens, 6 FLOPs/param/token).

Assumptions:

• 175B parameters
• 300B tokens
• 6 FLOPs per parameter per token

In summary:

Estimated total training compute for GPT-3: (\boxed{sim3 \times 10^{23}}) FLOPs
(based on 175B parameters, 300B tokens, 6 FLOPs/parameter/token)

Let's estimate the total number of floating-point operations (FLOPs) required to train GPT-3, based on what is known about its size, training data, and typical training procedures. Here's a step-by-step reasoning process:

1. Understand the model size and parameters:

• GPT-3 has approximately 175 billion parameters.
• Parameters are stored in FP32 or FP16 precision; often training uses mixed precision to reduce FLOPs slightly.

2. Determine the training dataset size:

• GPT-3 was trained on hundreds of billions of tokens. Reports suggest around 300 billion tokens.
• For simplicity, assume 300 billion tokens.

3. Estimate the number of training steps:

• To process 300 billion tokens, depending on batch size:

  Suppose:

  • Batch size = 1 million tokens (a plausible large batch size for such training, approximating high-performance hardware)

  Number of steps = Total tokens / Batch size:

  ( ext{Steps} = rac{300 imes 10^9}{10^6} = 300,000 )

  But in practice, the batch size per GPU (or per node) is smaller—say 1,000 tokens per batch, with multiple GPUs. The total number of steps is roughly on the order of 300,000 to 500,000.

  To be conservative, take approximately 300,000 steps for total training.

4. FLOPs per forward and backward pass:

• For each token, the transformer computes several matrix multiplications.
• Typically, the dominant cost per token in a transformer model scales with the model size.

A common approximation for FLOPs per token for training a transformer is:

( ext{FLOPs per token} approx 2 imes ext{number of parameters} imes ext{sequence length} )

But this depends on the specifics of the architecture. Historical estimates suggest:

• For large transformer models, about 6 FLOPs per parameter per token are required for training (this accounts for both forward and backward passes). This is a rough estimate from various literature.

Thus,

( ext{FLOPs per token} approx 6 imes ext{parameters} )

Plugging in GPT-3's parameters:

( 6 imes 175 imes 10^9 = 1.05 imes 10^{12} ext{ FLOPs per token} )

Note: This seems high; more refined estimates consider the overall cost per token is roughly on the order of a few trillion FLOPs, depending on the implementation.

Alternatively, a typical approximation used in literature (e.g., OpenAI's blog) is about 3 to 5 FLOPs per parameter per token.

Let's take 3 FLOPs per parameter per token for a more conservative estimate:

( 3 imes 175 imes 10^9 = 525 imes 10^9 = 5.25 imes 10^{11} ext{ FLOPs per token} )

Similarly, for total FLOPs:

( ext{Total FLOPs} approx ext{number of tokens} imes ext{FLOPs per token} )

Using 300 billion tokens and 5.25 × 10^{11} FLOPs per token:

( ext{Total FLOPs} approx 300 imes 10^9 imes 5.25 imes 10^{11} ) ( = (300 imes 5.25) imes 10^{20} ) ( = 1575 imes 10^{20} = 1.575 imes 10^{23} )

5. Adjust for training efficiency and hardware:

• Not every FLOP is used efficiently.
• Typically, the total number of FLOPs gives an upper bound.
• FLOPs estimates often consider the entire training process, including multiple epochs, but most models are trained with many passes over the data; in this case, since the tokens are large and the data volume is huge, training is roughly a single pass or a few passes.

6. Final estimate:

Given the approximations, a rough but reasonable total FLOPs estimate for training GPT-3:

( oxed{ ext{Total FLOPs} sim 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} } )

Summary:

• Parameters: 175 billion
• Tokens processed: ~300 billion
• FLOPs per token: about 5 × 10^{11}
• Total FLOPs: approximately 10^{23} FLOPs

Answer: The total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is roughly on the order of 10^23 FLOPs. This estimate considers GPT-3's 175 billion parameters, training on approximately 300 billion tokens, and accounts for the computational cost per token during training.

Certainly! Let's estimate the total number of floating-point operations (FLOPs) required to train GPT-3 by breaking down the problem step-by-step. We won't rely on online data but will reason from first principles and known architectural characteristics.

Step 1: Understand GPT-3's basic specifications

GPT-3, the largest model version, has approximately:

• Number of parameters (weights): 175 billion (1.75 × 10¹¹)
• Number of layers: about 96 transformer layers
• Model size: 175B parameters is widely known

Step 2: Estimate FLOPs per forward pass per token

A transformer forward pass consists mainly of:

• Matrix multiplications in self-attention
• Matrix multiplications in feedforward network (FFN)

Two main components dominate FLOPs:

1. Self-attention: roughly proportional to ( d_{model}^2 ) per token (where ( d_{model} ) is hidden size)
2. Feedforward layer: 2 linear layers per transformer layer, roughly (4 d_{model}^2) multiplications per token (due to expanding dimension by factor 4 in FFN)

Step 3: Extract hidden size and sequence length

From papers and common configurations:

• Hidden size ( d_{model} approx 12,288 ) (for 175B model)
• Sequence length used during training ( L approx 2048 ) tokens (max context length)

Step 4: Calculate approximate FLOPs per token per forward pass

Using formulas from transformer FLOPs estimation:

• For each transformer layer, per token, forward pass FLOPs roughly:

[ ext{FLOPs}_ ext{layer/token} approx 2 imes d_{model}^2 ]

(for attention and FFN combined, includes multiplications and additions)

Because the FFN (feedforward network) is the heaviest part, it dominates, so let's assume:

• ( sim 8 imes d_{model}^2 ) FLOPs per token per layer (this is a common estimate for one forward pass)

Substituting:

[ 8 imes (12,288)^2 approx 8 imes 1.5 imes 10^8 = 1.2 imes 10^9 ext{ FLOPs per token per layer} ]

For 96 layers:

[ 1.2 imes 10^9 imes 96 = 1.15 imes 10^{11} ext{ FLOPs per token (forward pass)} ]

Step 5: Account for backward pass

Backpropagation generally costs about 2× to 3× the forward pass FLOPs because computing gradients involves forward pass and backward pass computations.

Use factor 3 to be safe:

[ ext{FLOPs} = 3 imes 1.15 imes 10^{11} = 3.45 imes 10^{11} ext{ FLOPs per token (forward + backward)} ]

Step 6: Calculate total number of tokens used in training

From publicly known info, GPT-3 was trained on about 300 billion tokens (around 3 × 10¹¹ tokens) of text.

Step 7: Calculate total FLOPs for full training

Multiply FLOPs per token by total tokens:

[ 3.45 imes 10^{11} imes 3 imes 10^{11} = 1.035 imes 10^{23} ext{ FLOPs} ]

Final estimation:

[ oxed{ ext{Total FLOPs to train GPT-3} approx 10^{23} quad ext{FLOPs} } ]

Summary:

• Per token forward + backward FLOPs: (sim 3.5 imes 10^{11})
• Number of training tokens: (sim 3 imes 10^{11})
• Total training FLOPs: (sim 10^{23})

Additional notes:

• This estimate matches the order of magnitude widely discussed in ML circles.
• Variations depend on exact training steps, optimizer, precision (FP16/32), etc.
• Might be a bit lower or higher depending on exact implementation.

So, the training of GPT-3 requires on the order of ( 10^{23} ) floating point operations.

Here is one way to get to the oft‐quoted figure of "a few × 10^23 FLOPs" for training GPT‑3. I will make rough but plausible assumptions and carry through the arithmetic step by step:1. Model size – GPT‑3 "175 B" has about N ≈ 1.75×10^11 trainable parameters.2. Amount of training data – The paper says they trained on on the order of 3×10^11 tokens (≈ 300 billion tokens).3. FLOPs per token per parameter – In a forward pass each parameter participates in one multiply + one add → ≈2 FLOPs per parameter per token. – Back‐propagation through that parameter costs on the order of twice as much again (roughly another 4 FLOPs per parameter per token). – We can fold in any small extra cost for optimizer updates and say order‐of‐magnitude it to ≈ 6 FLOPs per parameter per token.4. Total FLOPs – FLOPs ≈ (FLOPs per parameter per token) × (number of parameters) × (number of tokens) – FLOPs ≈ 6 × (1.75×10^11) × (3×10^11) – ≈ 6 × 5.25×10^22 – ≈ 3.15×10^23 floating‐point operationsSo you end up with a training cost on the order of 10^23–10^24 FLOPs (often quoted as ≃3×10^23 FLOPs). That is roughly 300 zettaflops (300×10^21 FLOPs) in total.

Below is a simple "back-of-the-envelope" estimate that uses only a few public facts about GPT-3 and very generic rules of thumb for counting operations.

Step 1. Number of learned parameters
GPT-3's largest version contains ≈175 billion (1.75 × 10¹¹) trainable parameters.

Step 2. How much data was seen during training
OpenAI reports that the model was trained on about 300 billion tokens (3 × 10¹¹).

Step 3. How many floating-point operations does one parameter cost per token?
A practical rule of thumb for Transformer language models is
 Training FLOPs ≈ 6 × (# parameters) × (# training tokens)

Where does the factor 6 come from?

• Forward pass: every parameter is involved in one multiply-accumulate → 2 FLOPs
• Back-prop gradient computation: roughly another 2 FLOPs
• Parameter-update (optimizer) and miscellaneous overhead: ≈2 FLOPs
Total ≈6 FLOPs per parameter per token.

Step 4. Plug in the numbers
Total FLOPs = 6 × (1.75 × 10¹¹) × (3 × 10¹¹)
      = 6 × 5.25 × 10²²
      ≈ 3.15 × 10²³ FLOPs.

Step 5. Express the answer in more familiar units
3.15 × 10²³ ≈ 315 zettaFLOPs (1 ZFLOP = 10²¹ FLOPs).

Step 6. Sanity check with hardware-time intuition
An NVIDIA A100 delivers ≈ 312 teraFLOP/s (0.312 PFLOP/s) in mixed precision.
Wall-clock time on a single A100:
 3.15 × 10²³ / 3.12 × 10¹⁴ ≈ 1.0 × 10⁹ s ≈ 32 years.
Running on 1,000 A100s in parallel would take ≈12 days, which is the right ballpark for a large industrial training run.

Final estimate
Training GPT-3 (175 B parameters, 300 B tokens) requires on the order of 3 × 10²³ floating-point operations, i.e. roughly 300 zettaFLOPs.

Here's a back‐of‐the‐envelope derivation that gets us into the right ballpark (∼10²³ FLOPs total):

1. Model size
   • GPT–3 "175 B" has about P ≃1.75×10¹¹ parameters.

2. Number of training tokens
   • The public paper says "we train on ∼300 billion tokens" (N ≃3×10¹¹).

3. FLOPs per token
   • Every forward+backward through the network touches all parameters.
   • Rough rule of thumb: you need O(6) FLOPs per parameter per token
   (a couple multiplies/adds in the forward pass, a similar count in the backward, and some small extra for optimizer updates). • So 6 × P FLOPs/token ≃ 6×1.75×10¹¹ ≃1.05×10¹² FLOPs/token.

4. Total FLOPs
   • Multiply FLOPs/token by number of tokens:
   Total ≃ (1.05×10¹² FLOPs/token) × (3×10¹¹ tokens)
   ≃ 3.15×10²³ FLOPs.

5. Sanity check
   • 3×10²³ FLOPs is 3×10⁵ PFLOP·days (since 1 PFLOP/s×86 400 s ≈ 8.6×10¹⁹ FLOPs/day).
   • That's a few thousand GPU‐days on a modern accelerator cluster—consistent with the published "thousands of V100‐GPU days" statement.

Bottom‐line estimate: on the order of 10²³–10²⁴ floating‐point operations to train GPT‑3 175 B from scratch.

GPT-3 is one of the largest language models ever created with 175 billion parameters. The number of FLOPs required to train a neural network depends on factors such as the number of parameters, the size of the input data, the number of layers, and the batch size used during training.

To estimate the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3, we can consider the following:

1. Size of parameters: GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters. Each parameter needs to be updated during training, so we need to perform a certain number of FLOPs for each parameter update.

2. Number of training iterations: Training a large model like GPT-3 typically requires hundreds or thousands of training iterations. Each iteration involves multiple forward and backward passes through the network, so we need to consider the FLOPs required for each pass.

3. Batch size: The batch size used during training also affects the number of FLOPs required. Larger batch sizes require more FLOPs per iteration.

4. Complexity of the model: GPT-3 is a transformer-based model, which is known to be computationally intensive due to its self-attention mechanism. The FLOPs required for self-attention operations are typically higher compared to other types of neural network operations.

Given the large size of GPT-3 and the complex nature of transformer models, training it would require a massive amount of computational resources. Without searching online for specific numbers, we can estimate that the total number of FLOPs required to train GPT-3 would be in the order of 10^19 to 10^20 FLOPs. This is based on the fact that training large language models like GPT-2 (which has 1.5 billion parameters) required hundreds of petaflops of computation, and GPT-3 is significantly larger in size.

Let's estimate the FLOPs required to train GPT-3 without looking it up. We need to break this down into the key components: the model size and the amount of data used.

1. Model Size Estimation:

• Parameters: GPT-3 is famously large. Its largest version has 175 billion parameters. This is a key number to remember when thinking about its scale.
• Parameter Type: These parameters are typically stored as 32-bit floating-point numbers (FP32). So, each parameter is 4 bytes.
• Total Memory for Parameters: 175 billion parameters * 4 bytes/parameter = 700 billion bytes = 700 GB. This gives a sense of the model's memory footprint, which is related to the computational cost.

2. Data Size Estimation:

• Training Data: Large language models are trained on massive datasets of text. Commoncrawl, a large dataset of web pages, is often a significant component. Other sources like books and articles are also crucial. The exact size used for GPT-3 training is hard to pinpoint without knowing the data mix and filtering, but we're talking about hundreds of billions or even trillions of tokens. Let's estimate a plausible scale for a state-of-the-art model of that era. A common figure for data used for models around GPT-3's time was in the range of 300 billion to 500 billion tokens. Let's take a rough estimate of 500 billion tokens.
• Token Representation: Each token is processed in the model, and the computational cost per token depends on the model's complexity.

3. FLOPs per Operation:

• Matrix Multiplications: The core of transformer models like GPT-3 is matrix multiplication. In a forward pass through a layer, for a batch of size B, a sequence length L, and a hidden dimension H, matrix multiplications involve roughly ( 2 * H * H * L * B ) FLOPs. The self-attention mechanism adds further operations.
• Parameters and Operations: A rough rule of thumb for transformer models is that the forward pass through a single layer for a single token requires approximately ( 2 * ext{parameters_in_layer} ) FLOPs. Since the entire model has 175 billion parameters, and each parameter participates in computations, a simplified way to think about the computation per token is related to the total number of parameters. A common simplification is that the computational cost of a forward pass for one token is roughly ( 2 * ext{total_parameters} ). This comes from the dominant contribution of matrix multiplications where each parameter is involved in roughly two operations (a multiply and an add).

4. FLOPs per Token during Training:

• Training involves Forward and Backward Passes: Training involves a forward pass to calculate the output and loss, and a backward pass to calculate gradients. The backward pass is generally estimated to be about twice as computationally expensive as the forward pass. So, a forward pass + backward pass is roughly ( 3 imes ) the cost of a forward pass.
• FLOPs per Token: Using the simplified rule, the FLOPs per token during training would be approximately ( 3 imes (2 imes ext{total_parameters}) = 6 imes ext{total_parameters} ).
• Applying the Numbers: With 175 billion parameters, the FLOPs per training token is roughly ( 6 imes 175 imes 10^9 = 1050 imes 10^9 = 1.05 imes 10^{12} ) FLOPs per token.

5. Total Training FLOPs:

• Multiply by Data Size: To get the total training FLOPs, we multiply the FLOPs per token by the total number of tokens in the training data.
• Calculation: Total FLOPs ( approx ) (FLOPs per token) ( imes ) (Number of training tokens)
• Total FLOPs ( approx (1.05 imes 10^{12} ext{ FLOPs/token}) imes (500 imes 10^9 ext{ tokens}) )
• Total FLOPs ( approx (1.05 imes 500) imes 10^{12} imes 10^9 ) FLOPs
• Total FLOPs ( approx 525 imes 10^{21} ) FLOPs

6. Converting to ExaFLOPs:

• An exaFLOP (EFLOP) is ( 10^{18} ) FLOPs.
• Total EFLOPs ( approx 525 imes 10^{21} / 10^{18} ) EFLOPs
• Total EFLOPs ( approx 525 imes 10^3 ) EFLOPs = 525,000 EFLOPs

Refinement and Considerations:

• Simplifications: The "6 * parameters" rule is a simplification. The exact number of operations per token is more complex and depends on the specific architecture details (number of layers, attention heads, etc.), but this provides a reasonable order-of-magnitude estimate.
• Data Duplication/Epochs: Models are often trained for multiple "epochs," meaning they see the data multiple times. The 500 billion tokens is likely the size of the unique dataset. If it were trained for, say, an average of 2 epochs, the total effective tokens processed would be ( 2 imes 500 ) billion = 1 trillion tokens. This would double our FLOP estimate to around 1000-1050 EFLOPs. However, often the 500 billion figure already represents the total tokens processed over all epochs, or it's used as the scale number. Let's stick with the initial 500 billion tokens as the total processed amount for the estimate.
• Training Efficiency: Factors like computational efficiency of the hardware, batch size, and data parallelism can affect the time to train, but the total amount of computation (FLOPs) remains roughly the same for a given model and dataset size, assuming ideal scaling.

Conclusion and Final Estimate:

Based on the assumptions of 175 billion parameters trained on roughly 500 billion tokens, with the rule of thumb of 6 FLOPs per parameter per token during training, the estimated total FLOPs required to train GPT-3 is in the range of 500 to 600 ExaFLOPs.

Our calculation landed at around 525 ExaFLOPs. This aligns with general estimates floating around for models of this scale and era. The exact published number might differ slightly due to precise details of the architecture, data size, and training methodology, but this step-by-step reasoning provides a good order of magnitude estimate.

Estimated Total FLOPs: ~500-600 ExaFLOPs