Architectural Design and Performance Analysis of FPGA based AI Accelerators: A Comprehensive Review

arXiv:2603.08740v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Deep learning (DL) has emerged as a rapidly developing advanced technology, enabling the performance of complex tasks involving image recognition, natural language processing, and autonomous decision-making with high levels of accuracy. However, as these technologies evolve and strive to meet the growing demands of real-life applications, the complexity of DL models continues to increase. These models require processing of massive volumes of data, demanding substantial computational power and memory bandwidth. This gives rise to the critical need for hardware accelerators that can deliver both high performance and energy efficiency. Accelerator types include ASIC based solutions, GPU accelerators, and FPGA based implementations. The limitations of ASIC and GPU accelerators have led to FPGAs becoming one of the prominent solutions, offering distinct advantages for DL workloads. FPGAs provide a flexible and reconfigurable platform, allowing model specific customization while maintaining high efficiency. This article explores various hardware level optimizations for DL. These optimizations include techniques such as loop pipelining, parallelism, quantization, and various memory hierarchy enhancements. In addition, it provides an overview of state-of-the-art FPGA-based neural network accelerators. Through the study and analysis of these accelerators, several challenges have been identified, paving the way for future optimizations and innovations in the design of FPGA-based hardware accelerators.