LLMs are powerful but have limits: they can hallucinate, they’re only as good as their training and context, and they need to be used safely. Knowing these limits helps you design reliable products and avoid common pitfalls.
Limitations
- Can hallucinate (make up facts or citations)
- No real-time knowledge unless retrieved or fine-tuned
- Context window limit — can’t “remember” endless conversation
- May reflect biases in training data
- Struggle with precise math, long logic chains, or very niche domains
Safety & best practices
- Verify important facts; don’t trust output blindly
- Don’t put sensitive data in prompts (privacy, compliance)
- Use guardrails and content filters for user-facing apps
- Test edge cases and harmful prompts before shipping