Lesson 2 of 6
How AI Engines Choose What to Cite
AI engines run a retrieve → rerank → cite pipeline. This lesson shows what happens at each stage so you know exactly what you're optimizing for.
Learning objectives
- ▸Describe the retrieve-rerank-cite pipeline.
- ▸Name the three signals rerankers weigh most.
- ▸Explain why ranking #1 doesn't guarantee a citation.
The lesson
Read the full lesson →How Do AI Answer Engines Choose What to Cite?AI answer engines choose citations by retrieving candidate passages, reranking them on relevance, authority, and freshness, then quoting the few that best support the generated answer. Here is the pipeline, step by step.8 min readKey takeaways
- ▸Citation is a pipeline: retrieve candidate passages, rerank them, then cite the ones used.
- ▸Rerankers weigh relevance, authority, and freshness above keyword match.
- ▸A lower-ranked but cleaner, better-evidenced passage can be cited over the #1 result.
Knowledge check
Knowledge check
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1. What are the core stages that produce a citation?
2. Which signals does the reranker weigh most?
3. Does ranking #1 in Google guarantee an AI citation?