Knowledge Cutoff
A knowledge cutoff is the date beyond which an AI model has no training data, meaning it cannot answer questions about events, discoveries, or changes that occurred after that point. The cutoff exists because training a model requires a fixed dataset collected up to a specific date. This limitation is a key reason why grounding and RAG techniques are used to supplement model knowledge.
Example
If a model has a knowledge cutoff of April 2024, asking "Who won the 2025 Super Bowl?" will produce either an incorrect guess or an admission that it lacks this information. Connecting the model to a live search API via RAG solves this limitation.
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