Prompt-Engineering-Guide/pages/introduction/elements.en.mdx

# Elements of a Prompt

As we cover more and more examples and applications with prompt engineering, you will notice that certain elements make up a prompt. 

A prompt contains any of the following elements:

**Instruction** - a specific task or instruction you want the model to perform

**Context** - external information or additional context that can steer the model to better responses

**Input Data** - the input or question that we are interested to find a response for

**Output Indicator** - the type or format of the output.

You do not need all the four elements for a prompt and the format depends on the task at hand. We will touch on more concrete examples in upcoming guides.