Official guide · OpenAI
Make the success criteria visible before you ask for the answer
State the goal, role, constraints, output format, and examples explicitly so the model has less room to guess what “good” means.
Original source
Prompt engineering | OpenAI API
OpenAI · Official guide · checked 2026-07-15
What the source is saying
The guide recommends clear instructions, relevant context, examples, and iterative evaluation for more reliable results.
Try it in your work
Open the linked pattern for a reusable template, variables to change, and an example output shape.
Open the practical pattern →Keep in mind
More context is not automatically better. Keep only the information that changes the task or quality bar.