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BigDL

BigDL: Distributed TensorFlow, Keras and PyTorch on Apache Spark/Flink & Ray

From intel·Updated June 19, 2026·View on GitHub·

Intel will not provide or guarantee development of or support for this project, including but not limited to, maintenance, bug fixes, new releases or updates. Patches to this project are no longer accepted by Intel. If you have an ongoing need to use this project, are interested in independently developing it, or would like to maintain patches for the community, please create your own fork of the project. The project is written primarily in Jupyter Notebook, distributed under the Apache License 2.0 license, first published in 2017. It has gained significant community traction with 2,699 stars and 730 forks on GitHub. Key topics include: analytics-zoo, apache-spark, bigdl, deep-neural-network, distributed-deep-learning.

Latest release: v2.5.0b1— BigDL release 2.5.0b1
October 15, 2024View Changelog →

THIS PROJECT will be ARCHIVED by 6/30/2026

Intel will not provide or guarantee development of or support for this project, including but not limited to, maintenance, bug fixes, new releases or updates.
Patches to this project are no longer accepted by Intel.
If you have an ongoing need to use this project, are interested in independently developing it, or would like to maintain patches for the community, please create your own fork of the project.

[!IMPORTANT]
bigdl-llm has now become ipex-llm, and our future development will move to the IPEX-LLM project.

<div align="center"> <p align="center"> <img src="https://llm-assets.readthedocs.io/en/latest/_images/bigdl_logo.jpg" height="140px"><br></p> </div>

Overview

BigDL seamlessly scales your data analytics & AI applications from laptop to cloud, with the following libraries:

  • LLM (deprecated - please use IPEX-LLM instead): Optimizaed large language model library for Intel CPU and GPU

  • Orca: Distributed Big Data & AI (TF & PyTorch) Pipeline on Spark and Ray

  • Nano: Transparent Acceleration of Tensorflow & PyTorch Programs on Intel CPU/GPU

  • DLlib: “Equivalent of Spark MLlib” for Deep Learning

  • Chronos: Scalable Time Series Analysis using AutoML

  • Friesian: End-to-End Recommendation Systems

  • PPML: Secure Big Data and AI (with SGX/TDX Hardware Security)

For more information, you may read the docs.

Choosing the right BigDL library

mermaid
flowchart TD;
    Feature1{{HW Secured Big Data & AI?}};
    Feature1-- No -->Feature2{{Python vs. Scala/Java?}};
    Feature1-- "Yes"  -->ReferPPML([<em><strong>PPML</strong></em>]);
    Feature2-- Python -->Feature3{{What type of application?}};
    Feature2-- Scala/Java -->ReferDLlib([<em><strong>DLlib</strong></em>]);
    Feature3-- "Large Language Model" -->ReferLLM([<em><strong>LLM</strong></em>]);
    Feature3-- "Big Data + AI (TF/PyTorch)" -->ReferOrca([<em><strong>Orca</strong></em>]);
    Feature3-- Accelerate TensorFlow / PyTorch -->ReferNano([<em><strong>Nano</strong></em>]);
    Feature3-- DL for Spark MLlib -->ReferDLlib2([<em><strong>DLlib</strong></em>]);
    Feature3-- High Level App Framework -->Feature4{{Domain?}};
    Feature4-- Time Series -->ReferChronos([<em><strong>Chronos</strong></em>]);
    Feature4-- Recommender System -->ReferFriesian([<em><strong>Friesian</strong></em>]);
    
    click ReferLLM "https://github.com/intel-analytics/ipex-llm"
    click ReferNano "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#nano"
    click ReferOrca "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#orca"
    click ReferDLlib "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#dllib"
    click ReferDLlib2 "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#dllib"
    click ReferChronos "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#chronos"
    click ReferFriesian "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#friesian"
    click ReferPPML "https://github.com/intel-analytics/BigDL-2.x#ppml"
    
    classDef ReferStyle1 fill:#5099ce,stroke:#5099ce;
    classDef Feature fill:#FFF,stroke:#08409c,stroke-width:1px;
    class ReferLLM,ReferNano,ReferOrca,ReferDLlib,ReferDLlib2,ReferChronos,ReferFriesian,ReferPPML ReferStyle1;
    class Feature1,Feature2,Feature3,Feature4,Feature5,Feature6,Feature7 Feature;

Installing

  • To install BigDL, we recommend using conda environment:

    bash
    conda create -n my_env 
conda activate my_env
pip install bigdl

    To install latest nightly build, use pip install --pre --upgrade bigdl; see Python and Scala user guide for more details.

  • To install each individual library, such as Chronos, use pip install bigdl-chronos; see the document website for more details.

Getting Started

Orca

  • The Orca library seamlessly scales out your single node TensorFlow, PyTorch or OpenVINO programs across large clusters (so as to process distributed Big Data).

    <details><summary>Show Orca example</summary> <br/>

    You can build end-to-end, distributed data processing & AI programs using Orca in 4 simple steps:

    python
    # 1. Initilize Orca Context (to run your program on K8s, YARN or local laptop)
from bigdl.orca import init_orca_context, OrcaContext
sc = init_orca_context(cluster_mode="k8s", cores=4, memory="10g", num_nodes=2) 

# 2. Perform distribtued data processing (supporting Spark DataFrames,
# TensorFlow Dataset, PyTorch DataLoader, Ray Dataset, Pandas, Pillow, etc.)
spark = OrcaContext.get_spark_session()
df = spark.read.parquet(file_path)
df = df.withColumn('label', df.label-1)
...

# 3. Build deep learning models using standard framework APIs
# (supporting TensorFlow, PyTorch, Keras, OpenVino, etc.)
from tensorflow import keras
...
model = keras.models.Model(inputs=[user, item], outputs=predictions)  
model.compile(...)

# 4. Use Orca Estimator for distributed training/inference
from bigdl.orca.learn.tf.estimator import Estimator
est = Estimator.from_keras(keras_model=model)  
est.fit(data=df,
        feature_cols=['user', 'item'],
        label_cols=['label'],
        ...)
    </details>

    See Orca user guide, as well as TensorFlow and PyTorch quickstarts, for more details.

  • In addition, you can also run standard Ray programs on Spark cluster using RayOnSpark in Orca.

    <details><summary>Show RayOnSpark example</summary> <br/>

    You can not only run Ray program on Spark cluster, but also write Ray code inline with Spark code (so as to process the in-memory Spark RDDs or DataFrames) using RayOnSpark in Orca.

    python
    # 1. Initilize Orca Context (to run your program on K8s, YARN or local laptop)
from bigdl.orca import init_orca_context, OrcaContext
sc = init_orca_context(cluster_mode="yarn", cores=4, memory="10g", num_nodes=2, init_ray_on_spark=True) 

# 2. Distribtued data processing using Spark
spark = OrcaContext.get_spark_session()
df = spark.read.parquet(file_path).withColumn(...)

# 3. Convert Spark DataFrame to Ray Dataset
from bigdl.orca.data import spark_df_to_ray_dataset
dataset = spark_df_to_ray_dataset(df)

# 4. Use Ray to operate on Ray Datasets
import ray

@ray.remote
def consume(data) -> int:
   num_batches = 0
   for batch in data.iter_batches(batch_size=10):
       num_batches += 1
   return num_batches

print(ray.get(consume.remote(dataset)))
    </details>

    See RayOnSpark user guide and quickstart for more details.

Nano

You can transparently accelerate your TensorFlow or PyTorch programs on your laptop or server using Nano. With minimum code changes, Nano automatically applies modern CPU optimizations (e.g., SIMD, multiprocessing, low precision, etc.) to standard TensorFlow and PyTorch code, with up-to 10x speedup.

<details><summary>Show Nano inference example</summary> <br/>

You can automatically optimize a trained PyTorch model for inference or deployment using Nano:

python
model = ResNet18().load_state_dict(...)
train_dataloader = ...
val_dataloader = ...
def accuracy (pred, target):
  ... 

from bigdl.nano.pytorch import InferenceOptimizer
optimizer = InferenceOptimizer()
optimizer.optimize(model,
                   training_data=train_dataloader,
                   validation_data=val_dataloader,
                   metric=accuracy)
new_model, config = optimizer.get_best_model()

optimizer.summary()

The output of optimizer.summary() will be something like:

 -------------------------------- ---------------------- -------------- ----------------------
|             method             |        status        | latency(ms)  |     metric value     |
 -------------------------------- ---------------------- -------------- ----------------------
|            original            |      successful      |    45.145    |        0.975         |
|              bf16              |      successful      |    27.549    |        0.975         |
|          static_int8           |      successful      |    11.339    |        0.975         |
|         jit_fp32_ipex          |      successful      |    40.618    |        0.975*        |
|  jit_fp32_ipex_channels_last   |      successful      |    19.247    |        0.975*        |
|         jit_bf16_ipex          |      successful      |    10.149    |        0.975         |
|  jit_bf16_ipex_channels_last   |      successful      |    9.782     |        0.975         |
|         openvino_fp32          |      successful      |    22.721    |        0.975*        |
|         openvino_int8          |      successful      |    5.846     |        0.962         |
|        onnxruntime_fp32        |      successful      |    20.838    |        0.975*        |
|    onnxruntime_int8_qlinear    |      successful      |    7.123     |        0.981         |
 -------------------------------- ---------------------- -------------- ----------------------
* means we assume the metric value of the traced model does not change, so we don't recompute metric value to save time.
Optimization cost 60.8s in total.
</details> <details><summary>Show Nano Training example</summary> <br/> You may easily accelerate PyTorch training (e.g., IPEX, BF16, Multi-Instance Training, etc.) using Nano: 
python
model = ResNet18()
optimizer = torch.optim.SGD(...)
train_loader = ...
val_loader = ...

from bigdl.nano.pytorch import TorchNano

# Define your training loop inside `TorchNano.train`
class Trainer(TorchNano):
	def train(self):
	# call `setup` to prepare for model, optimizer(s) and dataloader(s) for accelerated training
	model, optimizer, (train_loader, val_loader) = self.setup(model, optimizer,
  train_loader, val_loader)
  
    for epoch in range(num_epochs):  
      model.train()  
      for data, target in train_loader:  
        optimizer.zero_grad()  
        output = model(data)  
        # replace the loss.backward() with self.backward(loss)  
        loss = loss_fuc(output, target)  
        self.backward(loss)  
        optimizer.step()   

# Accelerated training (IPEX, BF16 and Multi-Instance Training)
Trainer(use_ipex=True, precision='bf16', num_processes=2).train()
</details>

See Nano user guide and tutotial for more details.

DLlib

With DLlib, you can write distributed deep learning applications as standard (Scala or Python) Spark programs, using the same Spark DataFrames and ML Pipeline APIs.

<details><summary>Show DLlib Scala example</summary> <br/>

You can build distributed deep learning applications for Spark using DLlib Scala APIs in 3 simple steps:

scala
// 1. Call `initNNContext` at the beginning of the code: 
import com.intel.analytics.bigdl.dllib.NNContext
val sc = NNContext.initNNContext()

// 2. Define the deep learning model using Keras-style API in DLlib:
import com.intel.analytics.bigdl.dllib.keras.layers._
import com.intel.analytics.bigdl.dllib.keras.Model
val input = Input[Float](inputShape = Shape(10))  
val dense = Dense[Float](12).inputs(input)  
val output = Activation[Float]("softmax").inputs(dense)  
val model = Model(input, output)

// 3. Use `NNEstimator` to train/predict/evaluate the model using Spark DataFrame and ML pipeline APIs
import org.apache.spark.sql.SparkSession
import org.apache.spark.ml.feature.MinMaxScaler
import org.apache.spark.ml.Pipeline
import com.intel.analytics.bigdl.dllib.nnframes.NNEstimator
import com.intel.analytics.bigdl.dllib.nn.CrossEntropyCriterion
import com.intel.analytics.bigdl.dllib.optim.Adam
val spark = SparkSession.builder().getOrCreate()
val trainDF = spark.read.parquet("train_data")
val validationDF = spark.read.parquet("val_data")
val scaler = new MinMaxScaler().setInputCol("in").setOutputCol("value")
val estimator = NNEstimator(model, CrossEntropyCriterion())  
        .setBatchSize(128).setOptimMethod(new Adam()).setMaxEpoch(5)
val pipeline = new Pipeline().setStages(Array(scaler, estimator))

val pipelineModel = pipeline.fit(trainDF)  
val predictions = pipelineModel.transform(validationDF)
</details> <details><summary>Show DLlib Python example</summary> <br/>

You can build distributed deep learning applications for Spark using DLlib Python APIs in 3 simple steps:

python
# 1. Call `init_nncontext` at the beginning of the code:
from bigdl.dllib.nncontext import init_nncontext
sc = init_nncontext()

# 2. Define the deep learning model using Keras-style API in DLlib:
from bigdl.dllib.keras.layers import Input, Dense, Activation
from bigdl.dllib.keras.models import Model
input = Input(shape=(10,))
dense = Dense(12)(input)
output = Activation("softmax")(dense)
model = Model(input, output)

# 3. Use `NNEstimator` to train/predict/evaluate the model using Spark DataFrame and ML pipeline APIs
from pyspark.sql import SparkSession
from pyspark.ml.feature import MinMaxScaler
from pyspark.ml import Pipeline
from bigdl.dllib.nnframes import NNEstimator
from bigdl.dllib.nn.criterion import CrossEntropyCriterion
from bigdl.dllib.optim.optimizer import Adam
spark = SparkSession.builder.getOrCreate()
train_df = spark.read.parquet("train_data")
validation_df = spark.read.parquet("val_data")
scaler = MinMaxScaler().setInputCol("in").setOutputCol("value")
estimator = NNEstimator(model, CrossEntropyCriterion())\
    .setBatchSize(128)\
    .setOptimMethod(Adam())\
    .setMaxEpoch(5)
pipeline = Pipeline(stages=[scaler, estimator])

pipelineModel = pipeline.fit(train_df)
predictions = pipelineModel.transform(validation_df)
</details>

See DLlib NNFrames and Keras API user guides for more details.

Chronos

The Chronos library makes it easy to build fast, accurate and scalable time series analysis applications (with AutoML).

<details><summary>Show Chronos example</summary> <br/>

You can train a time series forecaster using Chronos in 3 simple steps:

python
from bigdl.chronos.forecaster import TCNForecaster 
from bigdl.chronos.data.repo_dataset import get_public_dataset

# 1. Process time series data using `TSDataset`
tsdata_train, tsdata_val, tsdata_test = get_public_dataset(name='nyc_taxi')
for tsdata in [tsdata_train, tsdata_val, tsdata_test]:
    data.roll(lookback=100, horizon=1)

# 2. Create a `TCNForecaster` (automatically configured based on train_data)
forecaster = TCNForecaster.from_tsdataset(train_data)

# 3. Train the forecaster for prediction
forecaster.fit(train_data)

pred = forecaster.predict(test_data)

To apply AutoML, use AutoTSEstimator instead of normal forecasters.

python
# Create and fit an `AutoTSEstimator`
from bigdl.chronos.autots import AutoTSEstimator
autotsest = AutoTSEstimator(model="tcn", future_seq_len=10)

tsppl = autotsest.fit(data=tsdata_train, validation_data=tsdata_val)
pred = tsppl.predict(tsdata_test)
</details>

See Chronos user guide and quick start for more details.

Friesian

The Friesian library makes it easy to build end-to-end, large-scale recommedation system (including offline feature transformation and traning, near-line feature and model update, and online serving pipeline).

See Freisian readme for more details.

PPML

BigDL PPML provides a hardware (Intel SGX) protected Trusted Cluster Environment for running distributed Big Data & AI applications (in a secure fashion on private or public cloud).

See PPML user guide and tutorial for more details.

Getting Support

Citation

If you've found BigDL useful for your project, you may cite our papers as follows:

  • BigDL 2.0: Seamless Scaling of AI Pipelines from Laptops to Distributed Cluster 
    @INPROCEEDINGS{9880257,
    title={BigDL 2.0: Seamless Scaling of AI Pipelines from Laptops to Distributed Cluster}, 
    author={Dai, Jason Jinquan and Ding, Ding and Shi, Dongjie and Huang, Shengsheng and Wang, Jiao and Qiu, Xin and Huang, Kai and Song, Guoqiong and Wang, Yang and Gong, Qiyuan and Song, Jiaming and Yu, Shan and Zheng, Le and Chen, Yina and Deng, Junwei and Song, Ge},
    booktitle={2022 IEEE/CVF Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (CVPR)}, 
    year={2022},
    pages={21407-21414},
    doi={10.1109/CVPR52688.2022.02076}
}
  • BigDL: A Distributed Deep Learning Framework for Big Data 
    @INPROCEEDINGS{10.1145/3357223.3362707,
    title = {BigDL: A Distributed Deep Learning Framework for Big Data},
    author = {Dai, Jason Jinquan and Wang, Yiheng and Qiu, Xin and Ding, Ding and Zhang, Yao and Wang, Yanzhang and Jia, Xianyan and Zhang, Cherry Li and Wan, Yan and Li, Zhichao and Wang, Jiao and Huang, Shengsheng and Wu, Zhongyuan and Wang, Yang and Yang, Yuhao and She, Bowen and Shi, Dongjie and Lu, Qi and Huang, Kai and Song, Guoqiong},
    booktitle = {Proceedings of the ACM Symposium on Cloud Computing (SoCC)},
    year = {2019},
    pages = {50–60},
    doi = {10.1145/3357223.3362707}
}

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This article is auto-generated from intel/BigDL via the GitHub API.Last fetched: 6/27/2026