Lightweight Edge Learning via Dataset Pruning

Abstract

Edge learning facilitates ubiquitous intelligence by enabling model training and adaptation directly on data-generating devices, thereby mitigating privacy risks and communication latency. However, the high computational and energy overhead of on-device training hinders its deployment on battery-powered mobile systems with strict thermal and memory budgets. While prior research has extensively optimized model architectures for efficient inference, the training phase remains bottlenecked by the processing of massive, often redundant, local datasets. In this work, we propose a data-centric optimization framework that leverages dataset pruning to achieve resource-efficient edge learning. Unlike standard methods that process all available data, our approach constructs compact, highly informative training subsets via a lightweight, on-device importance evaluation. Specifically, we utilize average loss statistics derived from a truncated warm-up phase to rank sample importance, deterministically retaining only the most critical data points under a dynamic pruning ratio. This mechanism is model-agnostic and operates locally without inter-device communication. Extensive experiments on standard image classification benchmarks demonstrate that our framework achieves a near-linear reduction in training latency and energy consumption proportional to the pruning ratio, with negligible degradation in model accuracy. These results validate dataset pruning as a vital, complementary paradigm for enhancing the sustainability and scalability of learning on resource-constrained mobile edge devices.