Unified Multimodal Understanding and Generation Models: Advances, Challenges, and Opportunities

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Zhao, Shanshan, Zhang, Xinjie, Guo, Jintao, Hu, Jiakui, Duan, Lunhao, Fu, Minghao, Chng, Yong Xien, Wang, Guo-Hua, Chen, Qing-Guo, Xu, Zhao, Luo, Weihua, Zhang, Kaifu
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
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author Zhao, Shanshan
Zhang, Xinjie
Guo, Jintao
Hu, Jiakui
Duan, Lunhao
Fu, Minghao
Chng, Yong Xien
Wang, Guo-Hua
Chen, Qing-Guo
Xu, Zhao
Luo, Weihua
Zhang, Kaifu
author_facet Zhao, Shanshan
Zhang, Xinjie
Guo, Jintao
Hu, Jiakui
Duan, Lunhao
Fu, Minghao
Chng, Yong Xien
Wang, Guo-Hua
Chen, Qing-Guo
Xu, Zhao
Luo, Weihua
Zhang, Kaifu
contents Recent years have seen remarkable progress in both multimodal understanding models and image generation models. Despite their respective successes, these two domains have evolved independently, leading to distinct architectural paradigms: While autoregressive-based architectures have dominated multimodal understanding, diffusion-based models have become the cornerstone of image generation. Recently, there has been growing interest in developing unified frameworks that integrate these tasks. The emergence of GPT-4o's new capabilities exemplifies this trend, highlighting the potential for unification. However, the architectural differences between the two domains pose significant challenges. To provide a clear overview of current efforts toward unification, we present a comprehensive survey aimed at guiding future research. First, we introduce the foundational concepts and recent advancements in multimodal understanding and text-to-image generation models. Next, we review existing unified models, categorizing them into three main architectural paradigms: diffusion-based, autoregressive-based, and hybrid approaches that fuse autoregressive and diffusion mechanisms. For each category, we analyze the structural designs and innovations introduced by related works. Additionally, we compile datasets and benchmarks tailored for unified models, offering resources for future exploration. Finally, we discuss the key challenges facing this nascent field, including tokenization strategy, cross-modal attention, and data. As this area is still in its early stages, we anticipate rapid advancements and will regularly update this survey. Our goal is to inspire further research and provide a valuable reference for the community. The references associated with this survey are available on GitHub (https://github.com/AIDC-AI/Awesome-Unified-Multimodal-Models).
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2505_02567
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Unified Multimodal Understanding and Generation Models: Advances, Challenges, and Opportunities
Zhao, Shanshan
Zhang, Xinjie
Guo, Jintao
Hu, Jiakui
Duan, Lunhao
Fu, Minghao
Chng, Yong Xien
Wang, Guo-Hua
Chen, Qing-Guo
Xu, Zhao
Luo, Weihua
Zhang, Kaifu
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Recent years have seen remarkable progress in both multimodal understanding models and image generation models. Despite their respective successes, these two domains have evolved independently, leading to distinct architectural paradigms: While autoregressive-based architectures have dominated multimodal understanding, diffusion-based models have become the cornerstone of image generation. Recently, there has been growing interest in developing unified frameworks that integrate these tasks. The emergence of GPT-4o's new capabilities exemplifies this trend, highlighting the potential for unification. However, the architectural differences between the two domains pose significant challenges. To provide a clear overview of current efforts toward unification, we present a comprehensive survey aimed at guiding future research. First, we introduce the foundational concepts and recent advancements in multimodal understanding and text-to-image generation models. Next, we review existing unified models, categorizing them into three main architectural paradigms: diffusion-based, autoregressive-based, and hybrid approaches that fuse autoregressive and diffusion mechanisms. For each category, we analyze the structural designs and innovations introduced by related works. Additionally, we compile datasets and benchmarks tailored for unified models, offering resources for future exploration. Finally, we discuss the key challenges facing this nascent field, including tokenization strategy, cross-modal attention, and data. As this area is still in its early stages, we anticipate rapid advancements and will regularly update this survey. Our goal is to inspire further research and provide a valuable reference for the community. The references associated with this survey are available on GitHub (https://github.com/AIDC-AI/Awesome-Unified-Multimodal-Models).
title Unified Multimodal Understanding and Generation Models: Advances, Challenges, and Opportunities
topic Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.02567