Definition
The ratio of relevant documents successfully retrieved to the total number of relevant documents available in the knowledge base. In RAG pipelines, it quantifies the system's ability to minimize 'false negatives' by ensuring all contextually necessary information is provided to the LLM.
Measures the 'completeness' of retrieval (minimizing omissions) rather than the 'purity' of the results (precision).
"A giant safety net at a circus designed to catch a performer regardless of where they fall, prioritizing total coverage over a narrow target."
- Precision(Complementary Metric)
- Top-K(Retrieval Parameter)
- Lost in the Middle(Trade-off (high recall can lead to context window saturation and performance degradation))
- Hit Rate(Simplified Component)
Conceptual Overview
The ratio of relevant documents successfully retrieved to the total number of relevant documents available in the knowledge base. In RAG pipelines, it quantifies the system's ability to minimize 'false negatives' by ensuring all contextually necessary information is provided to the LLM.
Disambiguation
Measures the 'completeness' of retrieval (minimizing omissions) rather than the 'purity' of the results (precision).
Visual Analog
A giant safety net at a circus designed to catch a performer regardless of where they fall, prioritizing total coverage over a narrow target.