Definition
A reasoning model is designed to solve problems through additional reasoning or inference rather than always producing an immediate answer.
One approach is chain-of-thought reasoning, in which a problem is approached through a sequence of intermediate deductions or inferences. The underlying idea is that breaking a difficult problem into smaller steps can improve the quality of the final result.
Other approaches can also be used, including structures such as:
- Tree of Thought
- Graph of Thought
- Tool-assisted reasoning
Reasoning models are particularly relevant for complex tasks where direct next-token generation may not be sufficient.
Why It Matters
Reasoning models introduce new ways to approach complex tasks — often trading extra latency and cost for a more reliable answer.