Optimal Transportfor Machine Learners

OT4ML is a book-centered ecosystem for optimal transport in machine learning: a rigorous PDF manuscript, a focused PDE4ML survey, an interactive web edition, reproducible figure notebooks, teaching material, course slides, and curated references.

The Book

This book presents optimal transport as a working language for machine learning. It starts from finite assignments and transport plans, builds the Monge and Kantorovich theories, develops Sinkhorn algorithms and generalized distances, and then uses this geometry to study gradient flows, learning dynamics, and transportation-based generative models.

How to cite

Cite the book

Gabriel Peyré. Optimal Transport for Machine Learners. arXiv:2505.06589 [stat.ML], submitted May 10, 2025; cross-listed in cs.AI and math.OC. DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2505.06589.

arXiv details
PDE4ML survey visual showing transport and PDE dynamics
Focus survey

PDEs for Machine Learning

A long survey of PDE tools for machine learning, written with an optimal-transport bias. It reorganizes the OT4ML material most relevant to dynamic OT, Wasserstein gradient flows, particle limits, diffusion models, flow matching, mean-field training, and transportation views of modern architectures.

Interactive Book

The web version follows the manuscript and places interactive panels beside the mathematical figures, so the reading flow stays centered on the book.

Figure Notebooks

The figure gallery is a searchable database: filter by concept or book section, inspect thumbnails, open notebooks on GitHub, and launch them in Colab.

Teaching Notebooks

Self-contained notebooks for classroom use and quick experimentation. Each can be opened in GitHub or launched directly in Colab.

Course Slides

Four slide decks provide a lecture-oriented route through the computational OT material.

Further Resources

Books, long reviews, surveys, and software are kept on a dedicated page so the homepage stays compact.