# Advancing Image Classification with Discrete Diffusion Classification Modeling

Source: [Advancing Image Classification with Discrete Diffusion Classification Modeling](<https://www.sota2.com/research/paper/692689a4d6b0dd33429304d4>)

Collection index: [llms.txt](<https://www.sota2.com/research/llms.txt>)

Data updated: 2025-11-27T05:03:33.578Z

Authors: Omer Belhasin, Shelly Golan, Ran El-Yaniv, Michael Elad

Published: 2025-11-25T12:42:26.000Z

## Abstract

Image classification is a well-studied task in computer vision, and yet it remains challenging under high-uncertainty conditions, such as when input images are corrupted or training data are limited. Conventional classification approaches typically train models to directly predict class labels from input images, but this might lead to suboptimal performance in such scenarios. To address this issue, we propose Discrete Diffusion Classification Modeling (DiDiCM), a novel framework that leverages a diffusion-based procedure to model the posterior distribution of class labels conditioned on the input image. DiDiCM supports diffusion-based predictions either on class probabilities or on discrete class labels, providing flexibility in computation and memory trade-offs. We conduct a comprehensive empirical study demonstrating the superior performance of DiDiCM over standard classifiers, showing that a few diffusion iterations achieve higher classification accuracy on the ImageNet dataset compared to baselines, with accuracy gains increasing as the task becomes more challenging. We release our code at https://github.com/omerb01/didicm .

## 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](<https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.20263>)

[PDF](<https://arxiv.org/pdf/2511.20263.pdf>)
