# Numerical influence of ReLU'(0) on backpropagation Source: [Numerical influence of ReLU'(0) on backpropagation]() Collection index: [llms.txt]() Data updated: 2025-10-26T01:56:42.060Z Authors: David Bertoin, J\\'er\\^ome Bolte, S\\'ebastien Gerchinovitz, Edouard Pauwels Published: 2021-06-23T09:28:17.000Z ## Abstract In theory, the choice of ReLU(0) in \[0, 1\] for a neural network has a negligible influence both on backpropagation and training. Yet, in the real world, 32 bits default precision combined with the size of deep learning problems makes it a hyperparameter of training methods. We investigate the importance of the value of ReLU'(0) for several precision levels (16, 32, 64 bits), on various networks (fully connected, VGG, ResNet) and datasets (MNIST, CIFAR10, SVHN, ImageNet). We observe considerable variations of backpropagation outputs which occur around half of the time in 32 bits precision. The effect disappears with double precision, while it is systematic at 16 bits. For vanilla SGD training, the choice ReLU'(0) = 0 seems to be the most efficient. For our experiments on ImageNet the gain in test accuracy over ReLU'(0) = 1 was more than 10 points (two runs). We also evidence that reconditioning approaches as batch-norm or ADAM tend to buffer the influence of ReLU'(0)'s value. Overall, the message we convey is that algorithmic differentiation of nonsmooth problems potentially hides parameters that could be tuned advantageously. ## Recorded benchmark results A research result applies to its stated dataset, split, metric and evaluation configuration. Compare like-for-like settings, preserve the metric's unit and direction, and distinguish paper-reported results from independent reproduction. The best result recorded here is not a claim of exhaustive, current global coverage. ## Original sources and implementation [Original paper]() [PDF]()