Abstract

The emergence of new, off-path smart network cards (SmartNICs), known generally as Data Processing Units (DPU), has opened a wide range of research opportunities. Of particular interest is the use of these and related devices in tandem with their host's CPU, creating a heterogeneous computing system with new properties and strengths to be explored, capable of accelerating a wide variety of workloads. This survey begins by providing the motivation and relevant background information for this new field, including its origins, a few current hardware offerings, major programming languages and frameworks for using them, and associated challenges. We then review and categorize a number of recent works in the field, covering a wide variety of studies, benchmarks, and application areas, such as data center infrastructure, commercial uses, and AI and ML acceleration. We conclude with a few observations.

Department(s)

Computer Science

Publication Status

Full Text Access

Comments

National Science Foundation, Grant 2344578

Keywords and Phrases

Acceleration; Data processing units; Distributed; DPU; Heterogeneous; Infrastructure; Off-path; Offload; Parallel; Smart network cards; SmartNIC

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

0167-739X

Document Type

Article - Journal

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2026 Elsevier, All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Mar 2026

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