Prompt engineering is the art and science of crafting inputs to elicit optimal outputs from language models.
Unlock hidden abilities of models without changing parameters
Dramatically improve relevance, accuracy, and usefulness
Guide models to perform specialized tasks without fine-tuning
Reduce token usage by getting better results in fewer attempts
Basic Prompting (2020-2021)
Simple instructions or questions with limited control
Few-Shot Learning (2021-2022)
Providing examples to demonstrate the expected pattern
Chain-of-Thought (2022-2023)
Instructing models to reason step-by-step
Advanced Techniques (2023+)
Structured prompting, metaprompting, and role-playing
Assigning specific roles or personas to guide model behavior
Providing examples that demonstrate the desired pattern
Encouraging step-by-step reasoning for complex problems
Specifying exact formats for model responses
1. Clear Context
Provide relevant background and constraints
2. Specific Instructions
Detailed guidance on what to do and how to do it
3. Format Specifications
Explicit structure for the desired output
4. Examples (optional)
Demonstrations of expected input-output pairs
5. Evaluation Criteria
Standards the response should meet
Example Template:
# Context
You are a [role] with expertise in [domain].
# Task
[Clear description of what needs to be done]
# Guidelines
- [Specific instruction 1]
- [Specific instruction 2]
- [Specific instruction 3]
# Output Format
[Description of how the output should be structured]
# Examples
Input: [Example input]
Output: [Example output]
Exploring multiple reasoning paths simultaneously
"Let's consider multiple approaches to this problem:
Approach 1: [First reasoning path]
Approach 2: [Second reasoning path]
Now, evaluating each approach..."
Interleaving reasoning steps with actions
"Thought: I need to find information about X
Action: Search for X
Observation: [search results]
Thought: Based on these results..."
Generating multiple answers and selecting the most consistent one
"Let me solve this multiple times and compare my answers:
Solution 1: ...
Solution 2: ...
The most reliable answer is..."
Key Techniques:
Key Techniques:
Key Techniques: