Tokenization

Tokenization is the process of breaking text into smaller pieces called tokens—such as words or subwords—that a language model can understand. For example, “ChatGPT” might become “Chat” and “GPT.” These tokens are then converted into numbers the model uses to process language. Tokenization affects how much text a model can handle at once, how fast it runs, and how accurate its output is. In short, it’s the first step in helping AI read and work with language.