{"slug": "pretraining", "title": "Pretraining", "summary": "Pretraining is the initial stage of training a language model, where it learns to predict the next token from a massive dataset of text and code, as explained in a technical article. This stage enables the model to acquire language, facts, code, and reasoning patterns, and is followed by fine-tuning and reinforcement learning to specialize behavior.", "body_md": "# Pretraining\n\nPretraining is the first stage of training a language model. Its main task is to predict the next token. Take “The capital of France is ___.” A pretrained model reads “The capital of France is” and predicts the next token, “Paris.”\n\nThe model makes a prediction, compares it with the real token, calculates the error, and updates its weights.\n\nTo pretrain a model, you repeat this step over and over, on a huge pile of text, code, and other data:\n\nAfter pretraining, the model has picked up language, facts, code, and common reasoning patterns from that data.\n\nPretraining is only the first stage. Compare it with the two stages that usually follow:\n\n| Stage | Goal | Data | Feedback signal |\n|---|---|---|---|\n| Pretraining | Learn general language patterns | Huge, mixed text and code | Next-token prediction error |\n| Fine-tuning | Learn a specific task or format | Small, curated examples | Difference from a labeled output |\n| RL | Learn a preferred behavior | The model’s own outputs | A reward score |\n\nPretraining teaches a model what patterns exist in its data. Feed it a lot of code, and it gets better at code. Feed it many tool-call examples, and tool use can become a natural part of its output.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/pretraining", "canonical_source": "https://julin.ai/2026/09/03/pretrain/", "published_at": "2026-09-02 12:00:00+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-09-04 02:53:10.368479+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["machine-learning", "large-language-models", "artificial-intelligence"], "entities": [], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/pretraining", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/pretraining.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/pretraining.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/pretraining.jsonld"}}