AI Glossary
Function calling
What is Function calling?
A feature of some LLMs that allows the model to output structured arguments for predefined functions, enabling it to trigger real-world actions — such as querying a database, making an API call, or sending an email — within an AI application.
Example in practice
A sales engineer building an AI assistant that can check live inventory would use function calling — the model decides when to call the inventory API and formats the request correctly without hardcoded logic.