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Quantiles, Not Points: Streaming Quantile Matching for Ordinal-Aware LLM-as-a-Judge Calibration

arXiv自然语言 2026-10-31 07:02 5 阅读 查看原文

LLM-as-a-judge scores are often distributionally shifted from human ratings on any given evaluation task, and post-hoc calibration (mapping LLM to human scores in a small labeled anchor set) has become a popular method to correct for this shift. In this paper we derive the calibration from two positions: that LLMaJ scores are ordinal ratings drawn from a distribution rather than isolated points.

We present streaming quantile matching (SQM), a version of a classical method not previously bench marked for LLMaJ calibration, which is built on the two positions by computing the optimal-transport map between the LLM and human score distributions.

  • We develop an evaluation framework and within it we show that unlike point-wise calibrations, SQM respects the ordinality of the human anchor set and achieves the best distributional fidelity and the top overall rank across models and data.
  • We also show that in general, post-hoc calibration narrows the raw error gap between smaller and larger judge models, which opens the possibility of more efficient LLM judges.

Introduction

LLM-as-a-judge scores are often distributionally shifted from human ratings on any given evaluation task, and post-hoc calibration (mapping LLM to human scores in a small labeled anchor set) has become a popular method to correct for this shift.

In this paper we derive the calibration from two positions: that LLMaJ scores are ordinal ratings drawn from a distribution rather than isolated points.

Methods

We present streaming quantile matching (SQM), a version of a classical method not previously bench marked for LLMaJ calibration, which is built on the two positions by computing the optimal-transport map between the LLM and human score distributions.

Key Ideas

  • LLM-as-a-judge scores are often distributionally shifted from human ratings on any given evaluation task, and post-hoc calibration (mapping LLM to human scores in a small labeled anchor set) has become a popular method to correct for this shift.
  • In this paper we derive the calibration from two positions: that LLMaJ scores are ordinal ratings drawn from a distribution rather than isolated points.
  • We present streaming quantile matching (SQM), a version of a classical method not previously bench marked for LLMaJ calibration, which is built on the two positions by computing the optimal-transport map between the LLM and human score distributions.

Streaming Quantile Matching (SQM)

We present streaming quantile matching (SQM), a version of a classical method not previously bench marked for LLMaJ calibration, which is built on the two positions by computing the optimal-transport map between the LLM and human score distributions.

Positions and Rationale

the two positions

Evaluation Framework

We develop an evaluation framework and within it we show that unlike point-wise calibrations, SQM respects the ordinality of the human anchor set and achieves the best distributional fidelity and the top overall rank across models and data.

Results

We develop an evaluation framework and within it we show that unlike point-wise calibrations, SQM respects the ordinality of the human anchor set and achieves the best distributional fidelity and the top overall rank across models and data.

Efficiency Implications

We also show that in general, post-hoc calibration narrows the raw error gap between smaller and larger judge models, which opens the possibility of more efficient LLM judges.

Experiments

Settings

LLM-as-a-judge scores are often distributionally shifted from human ratings on any given evaluation task, and post-hoc calibration (mapping LLM to human scores in a small labeled anchor set) has become a popular method to correct for this shift.

In this paper we derive the calibration from two positions: that LLMaJ scores are ordinal ratings drawn from a distribution rather than isolated points.

Comparison with Point-wise Calibrations

We develop an evaluation framework and within it we show that unlike point-wise calibrations, SQM respects the ordinality of the human anchor set and achieves the best distributional fidelity and the top overall rank across models and data.

Results

We develop an evaluation framework and within it we show that unlike point-wise calibrations, SQM respects the ordinality of the human anchor set and achieves the best distributional fidelity and the top overall rank across models and data.

  • We develop an evaluation framework and within it we show that unlike point-wise calibrations, SQM respects the ordinality of the human anchor set and achieves the best distributional fidelity and the top overall rank across models and data.
  • We also show that in general, post-hoc calibration narrows the raw error gap between smaller and larger judge models, which opens the possibility of more efficient LLM judges.

Conclusion

We also show that in general, post-hoc calibration narrows the raw error gap between smaller and larger judge models, which opens the possibility of more efficient LLM judges.