EARL: The 3rd Workshop on Evaluating and Applying Recommender Systems with Large Language Models

Abstract

This proposal outlines the organization of the 3rd Workshop on Evaluating and Applying Recommender Systems with Large Language Models (EARL), to be co-located with the 35th International ACM Conference on Knowledge and Information Management (CIKM 2026) in Rome, Italy. Following the strong engagement of the first two EARL editions, this third installment aims to solidify the workshop as a premier venue for advancing research at the intersection of large language models (LLMs) and recommender systems (RSs). EARL 2026 will foster discussions on the evaluation and practical deployment of LLM-driven RSs, emphasizing not only methodological soundness and reproducibility, but also the responsible integration of LLMs into real-world systems. By bringing together researchers and practitioners from academia and industry, the workshop will stimulate debate, encourage critical reflection, and shape future research directions in LLM-enhanced RSs.