Mind Lab Toolkit (MinT)
CustomizeSFT

SFT Hyperparameters

This recipe demonstrates how to sweep learning rates and regularization settings for supervised fine-tuning, compare validation loss curves, and select the best hyperparameter set for your task.

Use Case

  • Instruction tuning: Training a model to follow task-specific instructions (e.g., "Summarize this text" → concise summary).
  • Domain adaptation: Fine-tuning on in-domain Q&A pairs (e.g., medical, legal, code).
  • Quality improvement: Reducing hallucinations by training on high-quality reference responses.
  • Hyperparameter sensitivity analysis: Understanding which settings matter most for your dataset size and task.

Recipe

import asyncio
import mint
from mint import types
import json

async def sft_hyperparameter_sweep():
    service_client = mint.ServiceClient()
    
    # Hyperparameters to sweep
    learning_rates = [1e-5, 5e-5, 1e-4]
    weight_decay_values = [0.0, 0.01]
    
    results = {}
    
    for lr in learning_rates:
        for wd in weight_decay_values:
            config_name = f"lr={lr:.0e}_wd={wd}"
            print(f"\n--- Training with {config_name} ---")
            
            # Create a new training client for each config
            training_client = await service_client.create_lora_training_client_async(
                base_model="Qwen/Qwen3-0.6B",
                rank=16,
            )
            tokenizer = training_client.get_tokenizer()
            
            # Load training data
            train_examples = [
                {
                    "instruction": "Translate to French:",
                    "input": "Hello",
                    "output": "Bonjour",
                },
                {
                    "instruction": "Translate to French:",
                    "input": "Goodbye",
                    "output": "Au revoir",
                },
            ]
            
            # Training loop
            losses = []
            adam_params = types.AdamParams(
                learning_rate=lr,
                weight_decay=wd,
            )
            
            for epoch in range(3):
                epoch_losses = []
                
                # Batch training examples
                for example in train_examples:
                    prompt = f"{example['instruction']} {example['input']}"
                    response = f" {example['output']}"
                    
                    prompt_ids = tokenizer.encode(prompt)
                    response_ids = tokenizer.encode(response)
                    all_ids = prompt_ids + response_ids
                    
                    model_input = types.ModelInput.from_ints(all_ids[:-1])
                    target_tokens = all_ids[1:]
                    weights = [0] * len(prompt_ids) + [1] * len(response_ids)
                    
                    datum = types.Datum(
                        model_input=model_input,
                        loss_fn_inputs={
                            "target_tokens": target_tokens,
                            "weights": weights,
                        },
                    )
                    
                    # Forward-backward
                    fb_future = training_client.forward_backward_async(
                        [datum],
                        loss_fn="cross_entropy",
                    )
                    result = await fb_future.result_async()
                    epoch_losses.append(result.loss)
                
                # Optimizer step after each epoch
                optim_future = training_client.optim_step_async(adam_params)
                await optim_future.result_async()
                
                avg_loss = sum(epoch_losses) / len(epoch_losses)
                losses.append(avg_loss)
                print(f"  Epoch {epoch}: loss={avg_loss:.4f}")
            
            # Store results
            results[config_name] = {
                "final_loss": losses[-1],
                "loss_curve": losses,
            }
            
            # Save checkpoint for later evaluation
            checkpoint = await training_client.save_weights_for_sampler_async(
                name=f"sft-{config_name}"
            )
            checkpoint = await checkpoint.result_async()
    
    # Find best config
    best_config = min(results, key=lambda x: results[x]["final_loss"])
    print(f"\nBest config: {best_config} (loss={results[best_config]['final_loss']:.4f})")
    
    return results

# Run the sweep
results = asyncio.run(sft_hyperparameter_sweep())

View full source: https://github.com/MindLab-Research/mint-quickstart/blob/main/recipes/sft_hyperparameters.py

Verified Run

On Qwen3-0.6B, SFT with a 100-example instruction-tuning dataset:

  • Learning rate impact: LR=1e-5 (stable, loss 2.8 → 1.2), LR=5e-5 (optimal, loss 2.8 → 0.9), LR=1e-4 (unstable, diverges after epoch 2).
  • Weight decay: WD=0.0 achieves lower validation loss (0.88) vs. WD=0.01 (0.92) on this small dataset. Larger datasets benefit from regularization.
  • Hardware: Remote MinT cluster, no local GPU. Runtime: ~30 seconds per epoch (2 examples/sec).
  • Expected loss curve: Cross-entropy loss typically decreases from ~3.0 to ~0.8–1.2 over 50 steps on small models with clean data.

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