Judging

When large language models are reliable for judging empathic communication

• Abstract Large language models (LLMs) excel at generating empathic responses in text-based conversations. • But, how reliably do they judge the nuances of empathic communication?

When large language models are reliable for judging empathic communication

• Nature Machine Intelligence, Published online: 11 February 2026; doi:10.1038/s42256-025-01169-6 Kumar et al. • show that large language models (LLMs) nearly match expert reliabil