> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://shux.coder.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Best of N

> Improve plans, analysis, and reviews by asking Shux to explore multiple candidate answers in parallel

Best of N is triggered when you explicitly ask for it in your prompt — for example, `best of 3`, `best of 5`, or `best of 10`.

Shux interprets that as a request to launch N sibling sub-agents on the same task. The parent does a small amount of up-front analysis to capture shared context and reduce duplicated setup, but still leaves room for the children to approach the problem independently. It then waits for the child runs and synthesizes the strongest result.

Use it when you care more about answer quality than speed. In practice it often improves:

* plans
* deep analysis
* debugging
* code review
* anomaly detection in production metrics
* hard math or proof-style work

It tends to help most when the first plausible answer is often incomplete.

## Good fits

* **Gnarly debugging**: multiple plausible root causes, weak logs, or flaky repro steps
* **Deep math**: different solution paths may unlock the problem
* **Code review**: broader coverage of correctness, tests, design, and edge cases
* **Production metrics**: several competing explanations for an anomaly

<Note>
  Start with `best of 3` or `best of 5`. Larger batches cost more and take longer, but can pay off
  on high-stakes or unusually open-ended problems.
</Note>