No free lunch theorems for optimization

1997 · IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation · 14,234 citations · 36 from inside this corpus

David H. Wolpert, William G. Macready low

The source holds an abstract for this work, but its best open-access copy is under no open licence, which does not permit us to republish the text. Read it at the source below.

36 of 41 neighbouring works in this corpus. Blue is what this paper cites; orange is what cites it, and a dashed line is one neighbour citing another. Only the largest labels are drawn — every node carries its full title on hover.

this paper works it cites works citing it node size = global citations · hover for the full title

What this paper cites, inside the corpus

Paper	Year	Cited
Adaptation in Natural and Artificial Systems	1992	35,569
Artificial Intelligence through Simulated Evolution	1966	2,825
Evolution and Optimum Seeking	1995	2,202
Branch-and-Bound Methods: A Survey	1966	1,996
The Lack of A Priori Distinctions Between Learning Algorithms	1996	1,661

What cites it, inside the corpus

Paper	Year	Cited
Grey Wolf Optimizer	2014	19,144
GSA: A Gravitational Search Algorithm	2009	7,401
Harris hawks optimization: Algorithm and applications	2019	6,287
SCA: A Sine Cosine Algorithm for solving optimization problems	2016	5,696
Salp Swarm Algorithm: A bio-inspired optimizer for engineering design problems	2017	5,098
Moth-flame optimization algorithm: A novel nature-inspired heuristic paradigm	2015	4,645
Practical Genetic Algorithms	2003	4,249
Evolutionary programming made faster	1999	3,931
A novel swarm intelligence optimization approach: sparrow search algorithm	2020	3,807
Comprehensive learning particle swarm optimizer for global optimization of multimodal fun…	2006	3,758
Particle swarm optimization algorithm: an overview	2017	3,300
The Ant Lion Optimizer	2015	3,223
Understanding Machine Learning: From Theory To Algorithms	2015	3,081
Evolving artificial neural networks	1999	3,011
Ensemble based systems in decision making	2006	2,965
Multi-Verse Optimizer: a nature-inspired algorithm for global optimization	2015	2,942
The Arithmetic Optimization Algorithm	2021	2,931
Theoretical and numerical constraint-handling techniques used with evolutionary algorithm…	2002	2,332
On the Opportunities and Risks of Foundation Models	2021	2,265
Advanced nonparametric tests for multiple comparisons in the design of experiments in com…	2009	2,231
A novel metaheuristic method for solving constrained engineering optimization problems: C…	2016	2,223
A Cooperative Approach to Particle Swarm Optimization	2004	2,142
Adaptive Particle Swarm Optimization	2009	2,057
Shortcut learning in deep neural networks	2020	2,040
Parameter control in evolutionary algorithms	1999	1,971
Estimation of Distribution Algorithms: A New Tool for Evolutionary Computation	2001	1,936
Krill herd: A new bio-inspired optimization algorithm	2012	1,889
Stochastic ranking for constrained evolutionary optimization	2000	1,817
The Fully Informed Particle Swarm: Simpler, Maybe Better	2004	1,753
Butterfly optimization algorithm: a novel approach for global optimization	2018	1,725
The Lack of A Priori Distinctions Between Learning Algorithms	1996	1,661

Links

DOI · OpenAlex record

Topics

Metaheuristic Optimization Algorithms Research	Computer Science
Advanced Optimization Algorithms Research	Mathematics
Advanced Bandit Algorithms Research	Decision Sciences

Is this record sound?

complete

Nothing in this record contradicts itself and no field we check is missing.

supports2 author record(s) attached.
supports19 reference(s) recorded.
neutralThe DOI carries no year to check against.
supportsA title is present.

Provenance

Everything above was read from one stored OpenAlex payload, fetched 2026-09-04T03:58:40+00:00.

sha256 7e3d99a592f7f61f…