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Reranking
Phase 03 · RAGtechnique

A secondary pass using a specialized cross-encoder model to re-order initial retrieval candidates for higher accuracy.

Why it exists

Initial retrieval is fast but approximate. Rerankers evaluate query and document together for deeper accuracy.

How it works

Passes (Query, Chunk) pairs into a cross-encoder network (e.g. Cohere Rerank) that outputs precise relevance scores.

Where you'll use this