On the Oracle Complexity of First-Order and Derivative-Free Algorithms for Smooth Nonconvex Minimization

The (optimal) function/gradient evaluations worst-case complexity analysis available for the adaptive regularization algorithms with cubics (ARC) for nonconvex smooth unconstrained optimization is extended to finite-difference versions of this algorithm, yielding complexity bounds for first-order and derivative-free methods applied on the same problem class. A comparison with the results obtained for derivative-free methods by Vicente [Worst Case Complexity of Direct Search, Technical report, Preprint 10-17, Department of Mathematics, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal, 2010] is also discussed, giving some theoretical insight into the relative merits of various methods in this popular class of algorithms.