What is Prompt Engineering?

Full Definition

Prompt engineering is the discipline of designing, structuring, and iterating on the text inputs (prompts) given to language models in order to reliably achieve desired outputs. Techniques range from basic formatting (numbering steps, adding examples) to advanced strategies such as chain-of-thought prompting (asking the model to 'think step by step'), few-shot prompting (providing worked examples in the context window), role prompting (instructing the model to act as a specific persona), and self-consistency (sampling multiple responses and taking a majority vote). As models become more capable, prompt engineering has evolved toward system prompt design, structured output specifications, and agentic tool-use patterns. It remains a practical skill with outsized impact on the quality of AI-powered applications.