<p>Having the weights between 0 and 1 helps accelerate learning. They do not have to be between 0 and 1.
Typically the weights get normalized to [-1, 1]. But it also depends on your problem.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-03-05T09:05:45.330Z
Can you provide some evidence for the claim "Having the weights between 0 and 1 helps accelerate learning."? Have you observed this empirically? If yes, it might be a good idea to provide the link to such an experiment. If you have seen this written in a research paper or book, cite it.
nbro
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-03-04T14:00:24.430Z
2022-03-04T14:00:24.430Z
Jakob G
<p>I've been reading about neural networks for a long time, and I saw that in each one, the weights are always between 0 and 1. Why is this? I tried programming one, but the sigmoid function just seemed like one more thing to make it more complicated, without need. Why couldn't the range of a weight or neuron value be infinite?</p>

<neural-networks><weights><artificial-neuron>
Why do neural network weights have to be between 0 and 1?
Blue Herring
# Why do neural network weights have to be between 0 and 1?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2022-03-04)

I've been reading about neural networks for a long time, and I saw that in each one, the weights are always between 0 and 1. Why is this? I tried programming one, but the sigmoid function just seemed like one more thing to make it more complicated, without need. Why couldn't the range of a weight or neuron value be infinite?

**Tags:** neural-networks, weights, artificial-neuron


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2022-03-04. Score: 1 | Accepted answer

Having the weights between 0 and 1 helps accelerate learning. They do not have to be between 0 and 1.
Typically the weights get normalized to [-1, 1]. But it also depends on your problem.

> **Comments:**
> **username_2**: Can you provide some evidence for the claim "Having the weights between 0 and 1 helps accelerate learning."? Have you observed this empirically? If yes, it might be a good idea to provide the link to such an experiment. If you have seen this written in a research paper or book, cite it.  

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