Glossary · Agents & tools

Structured Output

Model output constrained or validated against a machine-readable schema so application code can consume fields without parsing free-form prose.

Why it matters

It reduces format ambiguity at the model-to-software boundary and enables field-level validation and retries.

In practice

Require an incident triage result with an allowed severity enum, evidence array, and nullable escalation reason, then reject any response that fails the schema.

Common confusion

Schema-valid output can still contain incorrect values. Structure is not factual verification.

Related terms

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