arXiv:2605.07330cs.LGcs.AI2026-05

通过稀疏更新减少99%通信量,实现无损权重同步

SparseRL-Sync: Lossless Weight Synchronization with ~100x Less Communication

  • 仅传输变化的参数位置和值,避免全量权重传输
  • 在99%稀疏下实现约100倍通信量缩减
  • 适合跨数据中心、异构资源等带宽受限场景

在大规模强化学习系统中,训练器与推理端分离执行时,需定期同步策略权重以减少策略过时。随着模型规模增大,通信开销急剧上升。在带宽受限或网络不稳定的部署环境(如跨数据中心、异构资源池、在线强化学习)中,权重同步成为吞吐量和尾延迟的主要瓶颈。我们观察到,主流大模型强化学习训练中,实际发生变化的参数在元素级别高度稀疏(常达99%以上)。基于此,我们提出并实现了SparseRL-Sync,将全量权重传输替换为可精确重构的稀疏更新包(索引与数值),保证100%精度。在简化成本模型下,每次更新通信量从S降至约S/X;当稀疏度达99%(X≈100)时,传输数据量减少约100倍。结合合理的分桶机制,还降低了启动和控制平面开销,显著提升带宽受限及高度异步强化学习场景下的可扩展性与端到端效率。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

In large-scale reinforcement learning (RL) systems with decoupled Trainer-Rollout execution, the Trainer must regularly synchronize policy weights to the Rollout side to limit policy staleness. When inter-node bandwidth is abundant, such synchronization is usually only a small fraction of end-to-end cost. As model size grows, however, the communication demand rises rapidly. In bandwidth-constrained or network-variable deployments -- for example, cross-datacenter or cross-cluster settings, heterogeneous resource pools, and online RL -- weight synchronization can become a dominant bottleneck for throughput and tail latency. We observe that, in mainstream large-model RL training, the locations where parameters actually change are highly sparse at the element level (often 99%+ sparsity). Building on this observation, we propose and implement SparseRL-Sync, which replaces full-weight transfers with a lossless sparse update payload (indices and values) that can be exactly reconstructed on the inference side, thereby preserving 100% fidelity. Under a simplified cost model, sparse synchronization reduces the per-update communication volume from S to approximately S/X; with 99% sparsity (X ~ 100), this yields about a 100x reduction in transmitted data. Combined with appropriate bucketing, SparseRL-Sync also reduces launch and control-plane overhead, significantly improving scalability and end-to-end efficiency in bandwidth-limited and highly asynchronous RL settings.

强化学习通信优化稀疏更新

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