Bi-Level Optimization for Generative Recommendation: Bridging Tokenization and Generation
Abstract
Generative recommendation is emerging as a transformative paradigm by directly generating recommended items, rather than relying on matching. Building such a system typically involves two key components: (1) optimizing the tokenizer to derive suitable item identifiers, and (2) training the recommender based on those identifiers. Existing approaches often treat these components separately—either sequentially or in alternation—overlooking their interdependence. This separation can lead to misalignment: the tokenizer is trained without direct guidance from the recommendation objective, potentially yielding suboptimal identifiers that degrade recommendation performance. To address this, we propose BLOGER, a Bi-Level Optimization for GEnerative Recommendation framework, which explicitly models the interdependence between the tokenizer and the recommender in a unified optimization process. The lower level trains the recommender using tokenized sequences, while the upper level optimizes the tokenizer based on both the tokenization loss and recommendation loss. We adopt a meta-learning approach to solve this bi-level optimization efficiently, and introduce gradient surgery to mitigate gradient conflicts in the upper-level updates, thereby ensuring that item identifiers are both informative and recommendation-aligned. Extensive experiments on multiple real-world datasets demonstrate that BLOGER consistently outperforms state-of-the-art generative recommendation methods while maintaining practical efficiency with no significant additional computational overhead, effectively bridging the gap between item tokenization and autoregressive generation. We release our code at https://github.com/Ten-Mao/BLOGER.
Assigned reviewers
| # | Reviewer | Match | Why (closest evidence publications in the taxonomy) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hao Deng 0011 | 61 | 77 MMQ: Multimodal Mixture-of-Quantization Tokenization for Semantic ID Generation and User Behavioral Adaptation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 76 REG4Rec: Reasoning-Enhanced Generative Model for Large-Scale Recommendation Systems (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 62 RCLRec: Reverse Curriculum Learning for Modeling Sparse Conversions in Generative Recommendation (2026) Generative Retrieval and Ranking |
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| 2 | Yupeng Hou | 61 | 89 Generating Long Semantic IDs in Parallel for Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 88 Towards Large Generative Recommendation: A Tokenization Perspective (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 87 Learning Vector-Quantized Item Representation for Transferable Sequential Recommenders (2023) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 3 | Qijiong Liu | 57 | 88 CoST: Contrastive Quantization based Semantic Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 88 Learning Multi-aspect Item Palette: A Semantic Tokenization Framework for Generative Recommendation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 63 Full Retraining, Incremental Fine-tuning, and Hybrid Serving: Model Updating and Serving for Industrial Generative Recommender Systems (2026) Generative Retrieval and Ranking |
Area chair
| Area chair | Match | |
|---|---|---|
| Xiaoyi Zeng | 53 |
Area-chair candidates (5)
| Xiaoyi Zeng assigned | 53 | 11 papers | |
| Kun Gai | 47 | 5 papers | |
| Maolin Wang 0001 | 45 | 15 papers | |
| Leyu Lin | 45 | 15 papers | |
| Weiming Liu 0005 COI: co-author | 45 | 8 papers |
Candidates from the panel ranked by match score
| # | Reviewer | Match | Load | Why | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hao Deng 0011 assigned | 61 | 3 | 77 MMQ: Multimodal Mixture-of-Quantization Tokenization for Semantic ID Generation and User Behavioral Adaptation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 76 REG4Rec: Reasoning-Enhanced Generative Model for Large-Scale Recommendation Systems (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 2 | Yupeng Hou assigned | 61 | 3 | 89 Generating Long Semantic IDs in Parallel for Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 88 Towards Large Generative Recommendation: A Tokenization Perspective (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 3 | Jieming Zhu | 59 | 3 | 88 CoST: Contrastive Quantization based Semantic Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 88 Learning Multi-aspect Item Palette: A Semantic Tokenization Framework for Generative Recommendation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 4 | Qijiong Liu assigned | 57 | 3 | 88 CoST: Contrastive Quantization based Semantic Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 88 Learning Multi-aspect Item Palette: A Semantic Tokenization Framework for Generative Recommendation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 5 | Bowen Zheng 0005 | 56 | 3 | 89 Generative Recommender with End-to-End Learnable Item Tokenization (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 86 Bridging Textual-Collaborative Gap through Semantic Codes for Sequential Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 6 | Qiang Luo 0004 | 54 | 3 | 88 DiffGRM: Diffusion-based Generative Recommendation Model (2026) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 69 OneLoc: Geo-Aware Generative Recommender Systems for Local Life Service (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 8 | Jinxin Hu | 52 | 3 | 86 HeterRec: Heterogeneous Information Transformer for Scalable Sequential Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 77 MMQ: Multimodal Mixture-of-Quantization Tokenization for Semantic ID Generation and User Behavioral Adaptation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 9 | Lichan Hong | 51 | 3 | 89 Recommender Systems with Generative Retrieval (2023) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 88 Better Generalization with Semantic IDs: A Case Study in Ranking for Recommendations (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 10 | Ed H. Chi | 51 | 3 | 88 Better Generalization with Semantic IDs: A Case Study in Ranking for Recommendations (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 74 Recommender Systems with Generative Retrieval (2023) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 11 | Han Li 0005 | 50 | 3 | 74 Generative Recommender with End-to-End Learnable Item Tokenization (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 59 OneSug: The Unified End-to-End Generative Framework for E-commerce Query Suggestion (2026) Recommendation with Search and Ranking |
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| 12 | Lantao Hu | 49 | 3 | 74 Generative Recommender with End-to-End Learnable Item Tokenization (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 68 Distinguished Quantized Guidance for Diffusion-based Sequence Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 13 | Xuanhua Yang | 49 | 3 | 64 Towards Personalized Bundle Creative Generation with Contrastive Non-Autoregressive Decoding (2022) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 58 GenRec: A Preference-Oriented Generative Framework for Large-Scale Recommendation (2026) Generative Retrieval and Ranking |
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| 14 | Junwei Pan COI: co-author | 48 | 3 | 73 Incremental Learning for LLM-based Tokenization and Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 63 Cross-Scale Collaboration between LLMs and Lightweight Sequential Recommenders with Domain-Specific Latent Reasoning (2026) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 15 | Yu Zhang 0206 | 48 | 3 | 70 HeterRec: Heterogeneous Information Transformer for Scalable Sequential Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 64 MMQ: Multimodal Mixture-of-Quantization Tokenization for Semantic ID Generation and User Behavioral Adaptation (2026) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 16 | Yongxin Ni | 47 | 3 | 53 Multi-Modality is All You Need for Transferable Recommender Systems (2024) Multimodal Generative Recommendation 52 Where to Go Next for Recommender Systems? ID- vs. Modality-based Recommender Models Revisited (2023) Multimodal Generative Recommendation |
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| 17 | Jiangxia Cao | 47 | 3 | 53 A Multi-modal Modeling Framework for Cold-start Short-video Recommendation (2024) Multimodal Generative Recommendation 52 QARM: Quantitative Alignment Multi-Modal Recommendation at Kuaishou (2025) Multimodal Generative Recommendation |
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| 18 | Bo Chen 0023 | 47 | 3 | 66 Generative Representational Learning of Foundation Models for Recommendation (2026) Generative Retrieval and Ranking 47 Full-Stack Optimized Large Language Models for Lifelong Sequential Behavior Comprehension in Recommendation (2026) Sequential and Session-based Recommendation |
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| 19 | Zhengyi Yang 0007 COI: co-author | 47 | 3 | 55 A Bi-Step Grounding Paradigm for Large Language Models in Recommendation Systems (2025) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization 51 Large Language Model Can Interpret Latent Space of Sequential Recommender (2026) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 21 | Shuchang Liu 0001 | 46 | 3 | 75 Distinguished Quantized Guidance for Diffusion-based Sequence Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 64 Fading to Grow: Growing Preference Ratios via Preference Fading Discrete Diffusion for Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 22 | Jiancan Wu COI: co-author | 46 | 3 | 88 Towards Large Generative Recommendation: A Tokenization Perspective (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 47 Large Language Model Can Interpret Latent Space of Sequential Recommender (2026) Sequential and Session-based Recommendation |
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| 23 | Wei Guo 0006 | 46 | 3 | 64 Killing Two Birds with One Stone: Unifying Retrieval and Ranking with a Single Generative Recommendation Model (2025) Generative Retrieval and Ranking 63 Full Retraining, Incremental Fine-tuning, and Hybrid Serving: Model Updating and Serving for Industrial Generative Recommender Systems (2026) Generative Retrieval and Ranking |
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| 24 | Ke Fei | 46 | 3 | 61 Sharpness-Consistent Cross-Domain Recommendation for Cold-Start Items (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 41 Stable and Adaptive Fusion for Multi-domain Multi-task Recommendation (2026) Multi-Scenario and Multi-Domain CTR Prediction |
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| 25 | Hao Liu 0078 | 46 | 3 | 47 Mitigating Distribution Shifts in Sequential Recommendation: An Invariance Perspective (2025) Contrastive and Self-Supervised Sequential Recommendation 47 WeaveRec: An LLM-Based Cross-Domain Sequential Recommendation Framework with Model Merging (2026) Efficiency and Deployment |
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| 26 | Jizhi Zhang COI: co-author | 46 | 3 | 75 Learnable Item Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 55 Decoding Matters: Addressing Amplification Bias and Homogeneity Issue in Recommendations for Large Language Models (2024) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 27 | Julian J. McAuley COI: co-author | 46 | 3 | 75 Towards Large Generative Recommendation: A Tokenization Perspective (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 73 Learning Vector-Quantized Item Representation for Transferable Sequential Recommenders (2023) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 28 | Jie Jiang 0015 COI: co-author | 46 | 3 | 73 Incremental Learning for LLM-based Tokenization and Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 63 Cross-Scale Collaboration between LLMs and Lightweight Sequential Recommenders with Domain-Specific Latent Reasoning (2026) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 30 | Ke Wang 0038 | 45 | 3 | 49 LLM-Grounded Diffusion for Cross-Domain Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 48 Multifaceted Relation-aware Meta-learning with Dual Customization for User Cold-start Recommendation (2023) Meta-Learning for Cold-Start Recommendation |
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| 33 | Yong He 0009 | 45 | 3 | 48 Task Similarity Aware Meta Learning for Cold-Start Recommendation (2022) Meta-Learning for Cold-Start Recommendation 48 An Industrial Framework for Cold-Start Recommendation in Zero-Shot Scenarios (2022) Content and Attribute-Based Cold-Start Recommendation |
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| 34 | Yongqi Li 0001 COI: co-author | 45 | 3 | 82 Learnable Item Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 70 Bridging Items and Language: A Transition Paradigm for Large Language Model-Based Recommendation (2024) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 35 | Lianghao Xia | 45 | 3 | 76 RecGPT: A Foundation Model for Sequential Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 45 Automated Self-Supervised Learning for Recommendation (2023) Graph Contrastive and Self-Supervised Learning |