Triton Inference Server

LATEST RELEASE: You are currently on the main branch which tracks under-development progress towards the next release.

Triton Inference Server provides a cloud and edge inferencing solution optimized for both CPUs and GPUs. Triton supports an HTTP/REST and GRPC protocol that allows remote clients to request inferencing for any model being managed by the server. For edge deployments, Triton is available as a shared library with a C API that allows the full functionality of Triton to be included directly in an application.

The current release of the Triton Inference Server is 2.21.0 and corresponds to the 22.04 release of the tritonserver container on NVIDIA GPU Cloud (NGC). The branch for this release is r22.04.

Features

• Deep learning frameworks. Triton supports TensorRT, TensorFlow GraphDef, TensorFlow SavedModel, ONNX, PyTorch TorchScript and OpenVINO model formats. Both TensorFlow 1.x and TensorFlow 2.x are supported. Triton also supports TensorFlow-TensorRT, ONNX-TensorRT and PyTorch-TensorRT integrated models.

• Machine learning frameworks. Triton supports popular machine learning frameworks such as XGBoost, LightGBM, Scikit-Learn and cuML using the RAPIDS Forest Inference Library.

• Concurrent model execution. Triton can simultaneously run multiple models (or multiple instances of the same model) using the same or different deep-learning and machine-learning frameworks.

• Dynamic batching. For models that support batching, Triton implements multiple scheduling and batching algorithms that combine individual inference requests together to improve inference throughput. These scheduling and batching decisions are transparent to the client requesting inference.

• Extensible backends. In addition to deep-learning frameworks, Triton provides a backend API that allows Triton to be extended with any model execution logic implemented in Python or C++, while still benefiting from full CPU and GPU support, concurrent execution, dynamic batching and other features provided by Triton.

• Model pipelines using Ensembling or Business Logic Scripting (BLS). A Triton ensemble represents a pipeline of one or more models and the connection of input and output tensors between those models. BLS allows a pipeline along with extra business logic to be represented in Python. In both cases a single inference request will trigger the execution of the entire pipeline.

• HTTP/REST and GRPC inference protocols based on the community developed KServe protocol.

• A C API allows Triton to be linked directly into your application for edge and other in-process use cases.

• A Java API is similar to C API and allows Triton to be linked directly to your Java application.

• Metrics indicating GPU utilization, server throughput, and server latency. The metrics are provided in Prometheus data format.

Documentation

The master branch documentation tracks the upcoming, under-development release and so may not be accurate for the current release of Triton. See the r22.04 documentation for the current release.

Triton Architecture gives a high-level overview of the structure and capabilities of the inference server. There is also an FAQ. Additional documentation is divided into user and developer sections. The user documentation describes how to use Triton as an inference solution, including information on how to configure Triton, how to organize and configure your models, how to use the C++ and Python clients, etc. The developer documentation describes how to build and test Triton and also how Triton can be extended with new functionality.

The Triton Release Notes and Support Matrix indicate the required versions of the NVIDIA Driver and CUDA, and also describe supported GPUs.

User Documentation

• QuickStart
  • Install Triton
  • Create Model Repository
  • Run Triton
• Model Repository
  • Cloud Storage
  • File Organization
  • Model Versioning
• Model Configuration
  • Required Model Configuration
    • Maximum Batch Size - Batching and Non-Batching Models
    • Input and Output Tensors
      • Tensor Datatypes
      • Tensor Reshape
      • Shape Tensor
  • Auto-Generate Required Model Configuration
  • Version Policy
  • Instance Groups
    • Specifying Multiple Model Instances
    • CPU and GPU Instances
    • Configuring Rate Limiter
  • Optimization Settings
    • Framework-Specific Optimization
      • ONNX-TensorRT
      • ONNX-OpenVINO
      • TensorFlow-TensorRT
      • TensorFlow-Mixed-Precision
    • NUMA Optimization
  • Scheduling and Batching
    • Default Scheduler - Non-Batching
    • Dynamic Batcher
      • How to Configure Dynamic Batcher
        • Delayed Batching
        • Preferred Batch Size
      • Preserving Request Ordering
      • Priority Levels
      • Queuing Policies
      • Ragged Batching
    • Sequence Batcher
      • Stateful Models
      • Control Inputs
      • Implicit State - Stateful Inference Using a Stateless Model
      • Sequence Scheduling Strategies
        • Direct
        • Oldest
    • Rate Limiter
  • Model Warmup
  • Inference Request/Response Cache
• Model Pipeline
  • Model Ensemble
  • Business Logic Scripting (BLS)
• Model Management
  • Explicit Model Loading and Unloading
  • Modifying the Model Repository
• Metrics
• Framework Custom Operations
  • TensorRT
  • TensorFlow
  • PyTorch
  • ONNX
• Client Libraries and Examples
  • C++ HTTP/GRPC Libraries
  • Python HTTP/GRPC Libraries
  • Java HTTP Library
  • GRPC Generated Libraries
    • go
    • Java/Scala
    • Javascript
• Performance Analysis
  • Model Analyzer
  • Performance Analyzer
  • Inference Request Tracing
• Jetson and JetPack

The quickstart walks you through all the steps required to install and run Triton with an example image classification model and then use an example client application to perform inferencing using that model. The quickstart also demonstrates how Triton supports both GPU systems and CPU-only systems.

The first step in using Triton to serve your models is to place one or more models into a model repository. Optionally, depending on the type of the model and on what Triton capabilities you want to enable for the model, you may need to create a model configuration for the model. If your model has custom operations you will need to make sure they are loaded correctly by Triton.

After you have your model(s) available in Triton, you will want to send inference and other requests to Triton from your client application. The Python and C++ client libraries provide APIs to simplify this communication. There are also a large number of client examples that demonstrate how to use the libraries. You can also send HTTP/REST requests directly to Triton using the HTTP/REST JSON-based protocol or generate a GRPC client for many other languages. For certain types of models you can also send input data (e.g. a jpeg image) directly to Triton in the body of an HTTP request without any additional metadata.

Understanding and optimizing performance is an important part of deploying your models. The Triton project provides the Performance Analyzer and the Model Analyzer to help your optimization efforts. Specifically, you will want to optimize scheduling and batching and model instances appropriately for each model. You can also enable cross-model prioritization using the rate limiter which manages the rate at which requests are scheduled on model instances. You may also want to consider combining multiple models and pre/post-processing into a pipeline using ensembling or Business Logic Scripting (BLS). A Prometheus metrics endpoint allows you to visualize and monitor aggregate inference metrics.

NVIDIA publishes a number of deep learning examples that use Triton.

As part of your deployment strategy you may want to explicitly manage what models are available by loading and unloading models from a running Triton server. If you are using Kubernetes for deployment there are simple examples of how to deploy Triton using Kubernetes and Helm: GCP, AWS, and NVIDIA FleetCommand

The version 1 to version 2 migration information is helpful if you are moving to version 2 of Triton from previously using version 1.

Developer Documentation

• Build
• Protocols and APIs.
• Backends
• Repository Agents
• Test

Triton can be built using Docker or built without Docker. After building you should test Triton.

It is also possible to create a Docker image containing a customized Triton that contains only a subset of the backends.

The Triton project also provides client libraries for Python and C++ that make it easy to communicate with the server. There are also a large number of example clients that demonstrate how to use the libraries. You can also develop your own clients that directly communicate with Triton using HTTP/REST or GRPC protocols. There is also a C API that allows Triton to be linked directly into your application.

A Triton backend is the implementation that executes a model. A backend can interface with a deep learning framework, like PyTorch, TensorFlow, TensorRT or ONNX Runtime; or it can interface with a data processing framework like DALI; or you can extend Triton by writing your own backend in either C/C++ or Python. Triton also allows developers to write backends that can send multiple responses for a request or not send any responses for a request. Backends and models that operate in this way are referred to as decoupled backends and models.

A Triton repository agent extends Triton with new functionality that operates when a model is loaded or unloaded. You can introduce your own code to perform authentication, decryption, conversion, or similar operations when a model is loaded.

Additional Resources

• Additional documentation, presentations, and examples are located in the NVIDIA Developer Zone.

• Specific end-to-end examples for popular models, such as ResNet, BERT, and DLRM are located in the NVIDIA Deep Learning Examples page on GitHub.

Contributing

Contributions to Triton Inference Server are more than welcome. To contribute make a pull request and follow the guidelines outlined in CONTRIBUTING.md. If you have a backend, client, example or similar contribution that is not modifying the core of Triton, then you should file a PR in the contrib repo.

Reporting problems, asking questions

We appreciate any feedback, questions or bug reporting regarding this project. When help with code is needed, follow the process outlined in the Stack Overflow (https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve) document. Ensure posted examples are:

• minimal – use as little code as possible that still produces the same problem

• complete – provide all parts needed to reproduce the problem. Check if you can strip external dependency and still show the problem. The less time we spend on reproducing problems the more time we have to fix it

• verifiable – test the code you're about to provide to make sure it reproduces the problem. Remove all other problems that are not related to your request/question.