Prompt

Level 1

The question or instruction you type to ask the AI to do something for you.

Level 2

The text you write to tell an AI what you want — like giving it a task or asking a question. Better prompts get better answers.

Level 3

The input text given to a language model that frames the task, provides context, and guides the model's output. Prompt engineering is the practice of crafting effective prompts.

Level 4

A structured input to an LLM that establishes context, constraints, and desired output format. Effective prompting leverages techniques like few-shot examples, chain-of-thought reasoning, and role specification.

Level 5

The conditioning sequence prepended to a generative model's context window that steers the posterior distribution over completions — manipulable through in-context learning, instruction tuning alignment, and constitutional constraints.

Sources

• NIST Trustworthy and Responsible AI Resource Center: Glossary — National Institute of Standards and Technology. Accessed 2026-07-20.