What the study found
The study found that large language models (LLMs) have been increasingly used in automated program repair, which is the task of patching software bugs. It also reports that this review is the first systematic literature review of LLMs in automated program repair from 2020 to 2025.
Why the authors say this matters
The authors conclude that their review provides a systematic overview of the research landscape for the automated program repair community. They say this can help researchers gain a comprehensive understanding of achievements and promote future research.
What the researchers tested
The researchers conducted a systematic literature review and analyzed 189 relevant papers. They examined the topic from the perspectives of LLMs, automated program repair, and their integration.
What worked and what didn't
The review reports four types of ways that LLMs are used to support automated program repair. It also describes repair scenarios that benefit from LLMs, including semantic bugs and security vulnerabilities, and discusses aspects such as input forms and open science. The abstract also says the paper highlights remaining challenges and potential guidelines for future research, but it does not list those challenges in detail.
What to keep in mind
The summary is limited to the abstract, so only broad findings are available here. The abstract does not provide detailed outcomes for individual reviewed papers or specific limitations of the review beyond noting that challenges remain to be investigated.
Key points
- The paper is a systematic literature review of large language models in automated program repair.
- It covers 189 relevant papers from 2020 to 2025.
- The authors identify four types of utilization strategies for using LLMs in automated program repair.
- The review discusses repair scenarios such as semantic bugs and security vulnerabilities.
- The abstract says the paper highlights remaining challenges and potential guidelines for future research.
Disclosure
- Research title:
- Review maps large language model use in automated program repair
- Authors:
- Quanjun Zhang, Chunrong Fang, Yang Xie, Yuxiang Ma, Weisong Sun, Yun Yang, Zhenyu Chen
- Institutions:
- Nanjing University, Nanjing University, Nanjing University, Nanjing University, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanyang Technological University, Swinburne University of Technology
- Publication date:
- 2026-03-02
- DOI:
- 10.1145/3799693
- OpenAlex record:
- View
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