CINXE.COM
Information Retrieval and the Web
<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <meta charset="utf-8" /> <link rel="canonical" href="https://research.google/research-areas/information-retrieval-and-the-web/" /><meta property="og:title" content="Information Retrieval and the Web"><meta property="og:url" content="https://research.google/research-areas/information-retrieval-and-the-web/"><meta property="og:image" content="https://storage.googleapis.com/gweb-research2023-media/images/Open_Graph.width-800.format-jpeg.jpg"><meta property="og:image:secure_url" content="https://storage.googleapis.com/gweb-research2023-media/images/Open_Graph.width-800.format-jpeg.jpg"><meta property="og:type" content="Website"> <title>Information Retrieval and the Web</title> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1 viewport-fit=cover"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/gr/static/assets/favicon.ico"> <link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.googleapis.com"> <link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.gstatic.com" crossorigin> <link rel="preload" href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Product+Sans&family=Google+Sans+Display:ital@0;1&family=Google+Sans:ital,wght@0,400;0,500;0,700;1,400;1,500;1,700&family=Google+Sans+Text:ital,wght@0,400;0,500;0,700;1,400;1,500;1,700&display=swap" as="style"> <link rel="stylesheet" href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Product+Sans&family=Google+Sans+Display:ital@0;1&family=Google+Sans:ital,wght@0,400;0,500;0,700;1,400;1,500;1,700&family=Google+Sans+Text:ital,wght@0,400;0,500;0,700;1,400;1,500;1,700&display=swap"> <link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Roboto+Mono:wght@400;700&display=swap" rel="stylesheet"> <link href="https://www.gstatic.com/glue/cookienotificationbar/cookienotificationbar.min.css" rel="stylesheet" /> <link href="https://www.gstatic.com/glue/v27_1/glue-material.min.css" rel="stylesheet"> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/gr/static/css/googleresearch.css?id=0c26ea1fed8bdd0324f9f4fad1f6a470"> <!-- Google Tag Manager --> <script>(function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start': new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0], j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src= 'https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f); })(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K8QBZ7Q'); </script> <!-- End Google Tag Manager --> </head> <body class=" js-google-tag-wrapper" data-gt-page-path="https://research.google/research-areas/information-retrieval-and-the-web/" data-env="production"> <!-- Google Tag Manager (noscript) --> <noscript><iframe src="https://www.googletagmanager.com/ns.html?id=GTM-K8QBZ7Q" height="0" width="0" style="display:none;visibility:hidden"></iframe></noscript> <!-- End Google Tag Manager (noscript) --> <header class="global-header glue-header glue-header--single not-glue"> <a href="#page-content" class="glue-header__skip-content">Jump to Content</a> <div class="glue-header__bar glue-header__bar--mobile not-glue"> <div class="glue-header__tier not-glue"> <!-- mobile lockup component --> <div class="glue-header__container"> <div class="glue-header__lock-up"> <!-- Hamburger button component --> <div class="glue-header__hamburger"> <button class="glue-header__drawer-toggle-btn" aria-label="Open the navigation drawer"> <svg class="glue-icon glue-icon--24px" role="presentation" aria-hidden="true"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#menu"></use> </svg> </button> </div> <div class="glue-header__logo"> <a class="glue-header__logo-link" href="/" title="Google Research"> <!-- Logo component --> <div class="glue-header__logo-container"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" alt='Google' class="glue-icon glue-icon glue-header__logo-svg"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#google-color-logo"></use> </svg> </div> <span class="glue-header__logo--product">Research</span> </a> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="glue-header__bar glue-header__bar--desktop glue-header__drawer"> <div class="glue-header__tier"> <!-- desktop lockup component --> <div class="glue-header__container"> <div class="glue-header__lock-up"> <div class="glue-header__logo"> <a class="glue-header__logo-link" href="/" title="Google Research"> <!-- Logo component --> <div class="glue-header__logo-container"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" alt='Google' class="glue-icon glue-icon glue-header__logo-svg not-glue --dark-logo"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#google-solid-logo"></use> </svg> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" alt='Google' class="glue-icon glue-icon glue-header__logo-svg --light-logo"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#google-color-logo"></use> </svg> </div> <span class="glue-header__logo--product">Research</span> </a> </div> </div> </div> <!-- linkbar component --> <div class="glue-header__container glue-header__container--linkbar"> <nav class="glue-header__link-bar navigation js-gt-global-nav-wrapper"> <ul class="glue-header__list"> <li class="glue-header__item js-sub-nav-parent --parent" data-gt-primary="Who we are" > <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false" > <span class=""> Who we are <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </span> </button> <div class="navigation__sub js-sub-nav" role="menu"> <div class="navigation__sub__container"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Who we are <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <div class="block-nav_drawer_columns_content"> <div class="navigation__sub--content" data-gt-secondary="Defining the technology of today and tomorrow."> <div class="navigation__sub__wrapper"> <div class="navigation__sub__heading"> <h2 class="headline-3">Defining the technology of today and tomorrow.</h2> </div> <ul class="navigation__sub__columns"> <li data-gt-secondary="Philosophy"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Philosophy </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">We strive to create an environment conducive to many different types of research across many different time scales and levels of risk.</p> <a href="https://research.google/philosophy/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Philosophy</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/philosophy/" > Philosophy </a> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="People"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> People </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">Our researchers drive advancements in computer science through both fundamental and applied research.</p> <a href="https://research.google/people/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our People</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/people/" > People </a> </div> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </li> <li class="glue-header__item js-sub-nav-parent --parent" data-gt-primary="Research areas" > <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false" > <span class=""> Research areas <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </span> </button> <div class="navigation__sub js-sub-nav" role="menu"> <div class="navigation__sub__container"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Research areas <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <div class="block-nav_drawer_columns_link_list"> <div class="navigation__sub--list"> <div class="navigation__sub__wrapper"> <ul class="navigation__sub__columns"> <li data-gt-secondary="Research areas"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading">Research areas</h2> <ul> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/" > Explore all research areas </a> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" data-panel="nested" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> Research areas <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </button> <div class="navigation__nested-sub js-sub-nav-parent"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Research areas <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <ul> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Explore all research areas <span> </span> </a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Foundational ML & Algorithms"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading">Foundational ML & Algorithms</h2> <ul> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/algorithms-and-theory/" > Algorithms & Theory </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/data-management/" > Data Management </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/data-mining-and-modeling/" > Data Mining & Modeling </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/information-retrieval-and-the-web/" > Information Retrieval & the Web </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/machine-intelligence/" > Machine Intelligence </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/machine-perception/" > Machine Perception </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/machine-translation/" > Machine Translation </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/natural-language-processing/" > Natural Language Processing </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/speech-processing/" > Speech Processing </a> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" data-panel="nested" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> Foundational ML & Algorithms <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </button> <div class="navigation__nested-sub js-sub-nav-parent"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Foundational ML & Algorithms <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <ul> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/algorithms-and-theory/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Algorithms & Theory <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/data-management/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Data Management <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/data-mining-and-modeling/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Data Mining & Modeling <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/information-retrieval-and-the-web/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Information Retrieval & the Web <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/machine-intelligence/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Machine Intelligence <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/machine-perception/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Machine Perception <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/machine-translation/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Machine Translation <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/natural-language-processing/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Natural Language Processing <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/speech-processing/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Speech Processing <span> </span> </a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Computing Systems & Quantum AI"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading">Computing Systems & Quantum AI</h2> <ul> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/distributed-systems-and-parallel-computing/" > Distributed Systems & Parallel Computing </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/hardware-and-architecture/" > Hardware & Architecture </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/mobile-systems/" > Mobile Systems </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/networking/" > Networking </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/quantum-computing/" > Quantum Computing </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/robotics/" > Robotics </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/security-privacy-and-abuse-prevention/" > Security, Privacy, & Abuse Prevention </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/software-engineering/" > Software Engineering </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/software-systems/" > Software Systems </a> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" data-panel="nested" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> Computing Systems & Quantum AI <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </button> <div class="navigation__nested-sub js-sub-nav-parent"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Computing Systems & Quantum AI <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <ul> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/distributed-systems-and-parallel-computing/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Distributed Systems & Parallel Computing <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/hardware-and-architecture/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Hardware & Architecture <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/mobile-systems/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Mobile Systems <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/networking/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Networking <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/quantum-computing/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Quantum Computing <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/robotics/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Robotics <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/security-privacy-and-abuse-prevention/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Security, Privacy, & Abuse Prevention <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/software-engineering/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Software Engineering <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/software-systems/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Software Systems <span> </span> </a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Science, AI & Society"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading">Science, AI & Society</h2> <ul> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/climate-and-sustainability/" > Climate & Sustainability </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/economics-and-electronic-commerce/" > Economics & Electronic Commerce </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/education-innovation/" > Education Innovation </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/general-science/" > General Science </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/health-bioscience/" > Health & Bioscience </a> </li> <li> <a class="navigation__sub__columns__list-link caption js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/research-areas/human-computer-interaction-and-visualization/" > Human-Computer Interaction and Visualization </a> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" data-panel="nested" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> Science, AI & Society <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </button> <div class="navigation__nested-sub js-sub-nav-parent"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile" role="menuitem" aria-haspopup="true"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Science, AI & Society <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <ul> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/climate-and-sustainability/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Climate & Sustainability <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/economics-and-electronic-commerce/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Economics & Electronic Commerce <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/education-innovation/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Education Innovation <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/general-science/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > General Science <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/health-bioscience/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Health & Bioscience <span> </span> </a> </li> <li role="menuitem"> <a href="https://research.google/research-areas/human-computer-interaction-and-visualization/" class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile__link" > Human-Computer Interaction and Visualization <span> </span> </a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </li> </ul> </div> </div></div> </div> </div> </li> <li class="glue-header__item js-sub-nav-parent --parent" data-gt-primary="Our work" > <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false" > <span class=""> Our work <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </span> </button> <div class="navigation__sub js-sub-nav" role="menu"> <div class="navigation__sub__container"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Our work <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <div class="block-nav_drawer_columns_content"> <div class="navigation__sub--content" data-gt-secondary=""> <div class="navigation__sub__wrapper"> <ul class="navigation__sub__columns"> <li data-gt-secondary="Projects"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Projects </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">We regularly open-source projects with the broader research community and apply our developments to Google products.</p> <a href="https://research.google/resources/our-projects/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Projects</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/resources/our-projects/" > Projects </a> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Publications"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Publications </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">Publishing our work allows us to share ideas and work collaboratively to advance the field of computer science.</p> <a href="https://research.google/pubs/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Publications</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/pubs/" > Publications </a> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Resources"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Resources </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">We make products, tools, and datasets available to everyone with the goal of building a more collaborative ecosystem.</p> <a href="https://research.google/resources/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Resources</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/resources/" > Resources </a> </div> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </li> <li class="glue-header__item js-sub-nav-parent --parent" data-gt-primary="Programs & events" > <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-target" aria-haspopup="true" aria-expanded="false" > <span class=""> Programs & events <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> </span> </button> <div class="navigation__sub js-sub-nav" role="menu"> <div class="navigation__sub__container"> <div class="navigation__sub__mobile-heading"> <button class="glue-header__link js-sub-nav-close-mobile"> <span class="sr-text">Back to</span> <span class="icon icon--caret"></span> Programs & events <span class="sr-text">menu</span> </button> <hr/> </div> <div class="block-nav_drawer_columns_content"> <div class="navigation__sub--content" data-gt-secondary="Shaping the future, together."> <div class="navigation__sub__wrapper"> <div class="navigation__sub__heading"> <h2 class="headline-3">Shaping the future, together.</h2> <a href="https://research.google/programs-and-events/" class="js-drawer-link" > Collaborate with us </a> </div> <ul class="navigation__sub__columns"> <li data-gt-secondary="Student programs"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Student programs </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">Supporting the next generation of researchers through a wide range of programming.</p> <a href="https://research.google/programs-and-events/student-engagement/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Student programs</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/programs-and-events/student-engagement/" > Student programs </a> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Faculty programs"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Faculty programs </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">Participating in the academic research community through meaningful engagement with university faculty.</p> <a href="https://research.google/programs-and-events/faculty-engagement/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Faculty programs</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/programs-and-events/faculty-engagement/" > Faculty programs </a> </div> </li> <li data-gt-secondary="Conferences & events"> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__desktop"> <h2 class="headline-6 navigation__sub__columns__heading"> Conferences & events </h2> <p class="navigation__sub__columns__description caption">Connecting with the broader research community through events is essential for creating progress in every aspect of our work.</p> <a href="https://research.google/conferences-and-events/" class="glue-inline-link js-drawer-link" > <span class="sr-text">Learn more about our Conferences & events</span> <span aria-hidden="true">Learn more</span> </a> </div> <div class="navigation__sub__columns__mobile"> <a class="glue-header__link" href="https://research.google/conferences-and-events/" > Conferences & events </a> </div> </li> </ul> <div class="navigation__sub__cta"> <a class="glue-button glue-button--high-emphasis js-drawer-link" href="https://research.google/programs-and-events/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" > Collaborate with us </a> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </li> <li class="glue-header__item " data-gt-primary="Careers" > <a class="glue-header__link " href="https://research.google/careers/" > <span class=""> Careers </span> </a> </li> <li class="glue-header__item " data-gt-primary="Blog" > <a class="glue-header__link " href="https://research.google/blog/" > <span class=""> Blog </span> </a> </li> </ul> </nav> </div> <!-- search (hide on search page) --> <div class="glue-header__search js-header-search"> <div class="glue-header__search__input"> <div class="search-input " data-type="header"> <input type="search" class="caption --empty-search js-search-bar js-gt-search-input" placeholder="Search"> <button class="search-input__button --search js-gt-search-btn"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--18px "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#search"></use> </svg> </button> <button class="search-input__button --clear"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--18px "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#close"></use> </svg> </button> </div> </div> <button class="glue-header__search__btn js-header-search-btn"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--24px search"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#search"></use> </svg> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--24px close"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#close"></use> </svg> <span class="sr-text js-header-search-sr-text">Search</span> </button> </div> </div> </div> <div class="glue-header__drawer-backdrop"> <div class="glue-header__mobile_close"> <button class="glue-header__drawer-toggle-btn js-mobile-nav-close" aria-label="Close the navigation drawer"> <svg class="glue-icon glue-icon--24px" role="presentation" aria-hidden="true"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#close"></use> </svg> </button> </div> </div> </header> <main id="page-content"> <div class="research-area-detail"> <section class="basic-hero bhoig --theme-dark " data-gt-id="basic_hero" data-gt-component-name=""> <div class="glue-page"> <div class="glue-grid"> <div class="bhoig__image-wrapper glue-grid__col--span-2 glue-grid__col--span-3-md glue-grid__col--span-2-lg"> <div class="bhoig__image-bg" style="background-color: var(--glue-grey-900); "> <span class="icon icon--information-retrieval-and-the-web" style="" ></span> </div> </div> <div class="bhoig__breadcrumb-wrapper glue-grid__col--span-10 glue-grid__col--span-9-md glue-grid__col--span-10-lg"> <nav class="glue-breadcrumbs" aria-label="Breadcrumbs"> <ol class="glue-breadcrumbs__list"> <li class="glue-breadcrumbs__item"> <a class="glue-breadcrumbs__link attribution" href="/">Home</a> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#chevron-right"></use> </svg> </li> <li class="glue-breadcrumbs__item"> <a class="glue-breadcrumbs__link attribution" href="/research-areas/">Research areas</a> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#chevron-right"></use> </svg> </li> </ol> </nav> </div> <h1 class="headline-1 bhoig__headline glue-grid__col--span-10 glue-grid__col--span-9-md glue-grid__col--span-10-lg">Information Retrieval and the Web</h1> <div class="basic-hero__description bhoig__description glue-grid__col--span-10 glue-grid__col--span-9-md glue-grid__col--span-10-lg"> <p data-block-key="6emxz">The science surrounding search engines is commonly referred to as information retrieval, in which algorithmic principles are developed to match user interests to the best information about those interests.</p><p data-block-key="83oj9">Google started as a result of our founders' attempt to find the best matching between the user queries and Web documents, and do it really fast. During the process, they uncovered a few basic principles: 1) best pages tend to be those linked to the most; 2) best description of a page is often derived from the anchor text associated with the links to a page. Theories were developed to exploit these principles to optimize the task of retrieving the best documents for a user query.</p><p data-block-key="6v2j1">Search and Information Retrieval on the Web has advanced significantly from those early days: 1) the notion of ""information"" has greatly expanded from documents to much richer representations such as images, videos, etc., 2) users are increasingly searching on their Mobile devices with very different interaction characteristics from search on the Desktops; 3) users are increasingly looking for direct information, such as answers to a question, or seeking to complete tasks, such as appointment booking. Through our research, we are continuing to enhance and refine the world's foremost search engine by aiming to scientifically understand the implications of those changes and address new challenges that they bring.</p> </div> <div class="bhoig__cta glue-grid__col--span-10 glue-grid__col--span-9-md glue-grid__col--span-10-lg"> </div> </div> </div> </section> <section class="offset-two-up"> <div class="glue-page glue-grid"> <div class="offset-two-up__left-col glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-4-sm glue-grid__col--span-12-md glue-grid__col--span-3-lg"> <h3 class="offset-two-up__headline headline-3">Recent Publications</h3> <div class="offset-two-up__cta-below-description"> <a class="glue-button glue-button--medium-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/?category=information-retrieval-and-the-web" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">See More</span> </a> </div> </div> <div class="glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-4-sm glue-grid__col--span-12-md glue-grid__col--span-9-lg"> <div class="publications-list --theme- row-card-list" data-hot-swap="pub-list" data-gt-id="publications_list" data-gt-component-name=""> <div class="row-card"> <div class="row-card__container"> <div class="row-card__body"> <a class="row-card__heading headline-6 glue-link" href=https://research.google/pubs/websites-need-your-permission-too-user-sentiment-and-decision-making-on-web-permission-prompts-in-desktop-chrome/ > Websites Need Your Permission Too – User Sentiment and Decision Making on Web Permission Prompts in Desktop Chrome </a> <div class="row-card__subheading"> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Marian Harbach </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> CHI 2024, ACM </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card__cta headline-6"> <div class="glue-tooltip" data-glue-tooltip-auto-position="false"> <button class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-tooltip__trigger" aria-describedby=tooltip-contentthe-web-utilizes-permission-prompt tabindex=0 > <span class="js-gt-item-id">Preview</span> </button> <span id="tooltip-contentthe-web-utilizes-permission-prompt" class="glue-tooltip__content" role="tooltip"> <span data-tooltip-type="simple"> Preview abstract </span> <span data-tooltip-type="rich"> <span class="glue-tooltip__body">The web utilizes permission prompts to moderate access to certain capabilities. We present the first investigation of user behavior and sentiment of this security and privacy measure on the web, using 28 days of telemetry data from more than 100M Chrome installations on desktop platforms and experience sampling responses from 25,706 Chrome users. Based on this data, we find that ignoring and dismissing permission prompts are most common for geolocation and notifications. Permission prompts are perceived as more annoying and interrupting when they are not allowed, and most respondents cite a rational reason for the decision they took. Our data also supports that the perceived availability of contextual information from the requesting website is associated with allowing access to a requested capability. More usable permission controls could facilitate adoption of best practices that address several of the identified challenges; and ultimately could lead to better user experiences and a safer web.</span> <a class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/websites-need-your-permission-too-user-sentiment-and-decision-making-on-web-permission-prompts-in-desktop-chrome/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">View details</span> </a> </span> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card"> <div class="row-card__container"> <div class="row-card__body"> <a class="row-card__heading headline-6 glue-link" href=https://research.google/pubs/insecurity-of-file-uploads-in-nodejs/ > (In)Security of File Uploads in Node.js </a> <div class="row-card__subheading"> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Harun Oz </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Abbas Acar </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Ahmet Aris </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106775/"> Güliz Seray Tuncay </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Amin Kharraz </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Selcuk Uluagac </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> The Web conference (WWW) (2024) </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card__cta headline-6"> <div class="glue-tooltip" data-glue-tooltip-auto-position="false"> <button class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-tooltip__trigger" aria-describedby=tooltip-contentfile-upload-is-a-critical-feature tabindex=0 > <span class="js-gt-item-id">Preview</span> </button> <span id="tooltip-contentfile-upload-is-a-critical-feature" class="glue-tooltip__content" role="tooltip"> <span data-tooltip-type="simple"> Preview abstract </span> <span data-tooltip-type="rich"> <span class="glue-tooltip__body">File upload is a critical feature incorporated by a myriad of web applications to enable users to share and manage their files conveniently. It has been used in many useful services such as file-sharing and social media. While file upload is an essential component of web applications, the lack of rigorous checks on the file name, type, and content of the uploaded files can result in security issues, often referred to as Unrestricted File Upload (UFU). In this study, we analyze the (in)security of popular file upload libraries and real-world applications in the Node.js ecosystem. To automate our analysis, we propose NodeSec– a tool designed to analyze file upload insecurities in Node.js applications and libraries. NodeSec generates unique payloads and thoroughly evaluates the application’s file upload security against 13 distinct UFU-type attacks. Utilizing NodeSec, we analyze the most popular file upload libraries and real-world ap- plications in the Node.js ecosystem. Our results reveal that some real-world web applications are vulnerable to UFU attacks and dis- close serious security bugs in file upload libraries. As of this writing, we received 19 CVEs and two US-CERT cases for the security issues that we reported. Our findings provide strong evidence that the dynamic features of Node.js applications introduce security shortcomings and that web developers should be cautious when implementing file upload features in their applications.</span> <a class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/insecurity-of-file-uploads-in-nodejs/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">View details</span> </a> </span> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card"> <div class="row-card__container"> <div class="row-card__body"> <a class="row-card__heading headline-6 glue-link" href=https://research.google/pubs/beyond-yes-and-no-improving-zero-shot-pointwise-llm-rankers-via-scoring-fine-grained-relevance-labels/ > Beyond Yes and No: Improving Zero-Shot Pointwise LLM Rankers via Scoring Fine-Grained Relevance Labels </a> <div class="row-card__subheading"> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106867/"> Honglei Zhuang </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106036/"> Zhen Qin </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/kaihui/"> Kai Hui </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/junruwu/"> Junru Wu </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/107103/"> Le Yan </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/xuanhuiwang/"> Xuanhui Wang </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/michaelbendersky/"> Michael Bendersky </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Proceedings of the 2024 Conference of the North American Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics (NAACL) </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card__cta headline-6"> <div class="glue-tooltip" data-glue-tooltip-auto-position="false"> <button class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-tooltip__trigger" aria-describedby=tooltip-contentzero-shot-text-rankers-powered-by tabindex=0 > <span class="js-gt-item-id">Preview</span> </button> <span id="tooltip-contentzero-shot-text-rankers-powered-by" class="glue-tooltip__content" role="tooltip"> <span data-tooltip-type="simple"> Preview abstract </span> <span data-tooltip-type="rich"> <span class="glue-tooltip__body">Zero-shot text rankers powered by recent LLMs achieve remarkable ranking performance by simply prompting. Existing prompts for pointwise LLM rankers mostly ask the model to choose from binary relevance labels like "Yes" and "No". However, the lack of intermediate relevance label options may cause the LLM to provide noisy or biased answers for documents that are partially relevant to the query. We propose to incorporate fine-grained relevance labels into the prompt for LLM rankers, enabling them to better differentiate among documents with different levels of relevance to the query and thus derive a more accurate ranking. We study two variants of the prompt template, coupled with different numbers of relevance levels. Our experiments on 8 BEIR data sets show that adding fine-grained relevance labels significantly improves the performance of LLM rankers.</span> <a class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/beyond-yes-and-no-improving-zero-shot-pointwise-llm-rankers-via-scoring-fine-grained-relevance-labels/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">View details</span> </a> </span> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card"> <div class="row-card__container"> <div class="row-card__body"> <a class="row-card__heading headline-6 glue-link" href=https://research.google/pubs/dont-interrupt-me-a-large-scale-study-of-on-device-permission-prompt-quieting-in-chrome/ > Don’t Interrupt Me – A Large-Scale Study of On-Device Permission Prompt Quieting in Chrome </a> <div class="row-card__subheading"> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Marian Harbach </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/igorbilogrevic/"> Igor Bilogrevic </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/enricobacis/"> Enrico Bacis </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/serenachen/"> Serena Chen </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Ravjit Uppal </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Andy Paicu </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Elias Klim </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106952/"> Meggyn Watkins </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Balazs Engedy </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> (2024) </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card__cta headline-6"> <div class="glue-tooltip" data-glue-tooltip-auto-position="false"> <button class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-tooltip__trigger" aria-describedby=tooltip-contenta-recent-large-scale-experiment-co tabindex=0 > <span class="js-gt-item-id">Preview</span> </button> <span id="tooltip-contenta-recent-large-scale-experiment-co" class="glue-tooltip__content" role="tooltip"> <span data-tooltip-type="simple"> Preview abstract </span> <span data-tooltip-type="rich"> <span class="glue-tooltip__body">A recent large-scale experiment conducted by Chrome has demonstrated that a "quieter" web permission prompt can reduce unwanted interruptions while only marginally affecting grant rates. However, the experiment and the partial roll-out were missing two important elements: (1) an effective and context-aware activation mechanism for such a quieter prompt, and (2) an analysis of user attitudes and sentiment towards such an intervention. In this paper, we address these two limitations by means of a novel ML-based activation mechanism -- and its real-world on-device deployment in Chrome -- and a large-scale user study with 13.1k participants from 156 countries. First, the telemetry-based results, computed on more than 20 million samples from Chrome users in-the-wild, indicate that the novel on-device ML-based approach is both extremely precise (>99% post-hoc precision) and has very high coverage (96% recall for notifications permission). Second, our large-scale, in-context user study shows that quieting is often perceived as helpful and does not cause high levels of unease for most respondents.</span> <a class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/dont-interrupt-me-a-large-scale-study-of-on-device-permission-prompt-quieting-in-chrome/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">View details</span> </a> </span> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card"> <div class="row-card__container"> <div class="row-card__body"> <a class="row-card__heading headline-6 glue-link" href=https://research.google/pubs/scaling-up-llm-reviews-for-google-ads-content-moderation/ > Scaling Up LLM Reviews for Google Ads Content Moderation </a> <div class="row-card__subheading"> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Ariel Fuxman </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Chih-Chun Chia </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106420/"> Chun-Ta Lu </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Dongjin Kwon </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Enming Luo </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Mehmet Tek </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/107665/"> Otilia Stretcu </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Ranjay Krishna </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Tiantian Fang </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Tushar Dogra </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/weiqiao/"> Wei Qiao </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Yu-Han Lyu </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/yuanwang/"> Yuan Wang </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> (2024) </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card__cta headline-6"> <div class="glue-tooltip" data-glue-tooltip-auto-position="false"> <button class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-tooltip__trigger" aria-describedby=tooltip-contentlarge-language-models-llms-are-p tabindex=0 > <span class="js-gt-item-id">Preview</span> </button> <span id="tooltip-contentlarge-language-models-llms-are-p" class="glue-tooltip__content" role="tooltip"> <span data-tooltip-type="simple"> Preview abstract </span> <span data-tooltip-type="rich"> <span class="glue-tooltip__body">Large language models (LLMs) are powerful tools for content moderation but LLM inference costs and latency on large volumes of data, such as the Google Ads repository, are prohibitive for their casual usage. This study is focused on scaling up LLM reviews for content moderation in Google Ads. First, we use heuristics to select candidates via filtering and duplicate removal, and create clusters of ads for which we select one representative ad per cluster. Then, LLMs are used to review only the representative ads. Finally we propagate the LLM decisions for representative ads back to their clusters. This method reduces the number of reviews by more than 3 orders of magnitude while achieving a 2x recall compared to a non-LLM model as a baseline. Note that, the success of this approach is a strong function of the representations used in clustering and label propagation; we observed that cross-modal similarity representations yield better results than uni-modal representations.</span> <a class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/scaling-up-llm-reviews-for-google-ads-content-moderation/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">View details</span> </a> </span> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card"> <div class="row-card__container"> <div class="row-card__body"> <a class="row-card__heading headline-6 glue-link" href=https://research.google/pubs/large-language-models-are-effective-text-rankers-with-pairwise-ranking-prompting/ > Large Language Models are Effective Text Rankers with Pairwise Ranking Prompting </a> <div class="row-card__subheading"> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106036/"> Zhen Qin </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/rolfjagerman/"> Rolf Jagerman </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/kaihui/"> Kai Hui </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106867/"> Honglei Zhuang </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/junruwu/"> Junru Wu </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/107103/"> Le Yan </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/jiamingshen/"> Jiaming Shen </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/tianqiliu/"> Tianqi Liu </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/106192/"> Jialu Liu </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/donaldmetzler/"> Don Metzler </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/xuanhuiwang/"> Xuanhui Wang </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> <a class="row-card__small-link" href="/people/michaelbendersky/"> Michael Bendersky </a> </div> <div class="row-card__subheading__spacer"></div> <div class="row-card__subheading__item extra-small-text"> Conference of the North American Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics (NAACL) (2024) </div> </div> </div> <div class="row-card__cta headline-6"> <div class="glue-tooltip" data-glue-tooltip-auto-position="false"> <button class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-tooltip__trigger" aria-describedby=tooltip-contentranking-documents-using-large-lang tabindex=0 > <span class="js-gt-item-id">Preview</span> </button> <span id="tooltip-contentranking-documents-using-large-lang" class="glue-tooltip__content" role="tooltip"> <span data-tooltip-type="simple"> Preview abstract </span> <span data-tooltip-type="rich"> <span class="glue-tooltip__body">Ranking documents using Large Language Models (LLMs) by directly feeding the query and candidate documents into the prompt is an interesting and practical problem. However, researchers have found it difficult to outperform fine-tuned baseline rankers on benchmark datasets. We analyze pointwise and listwise ranking prompts used by existing methods and argue that off-the-shelf LLMs do not fully understand these challenging ranking formulations. In this paper, we propose to significantly reduce the burden on LLMs by using a new technique called Pairwise Ranking Prompting (PRP). Our results are the first in the literature to achieve state-of-the-art ranking performance on standard benchmarks using moderate-sized open-sourced LLMs. On TREC-DL 2019&2020, PRP based on the Flan-UL2 model with 20B parameters performs favorably with the previous best approach in the literature, which is based on the blackbox commercial GPT-4 that has 50x (estimated) model size, while outperforming other LLM-based solutions, such as InstructGPT which has 175B parameters, by over 10% for all ranking metrics. By using the same prompt template on seven BEIR tasks, PRP outperforms supervised baselines and outperforms the blackbox commercial ChatGPT solution by 4.2% and pointwise LLM-based solutions by more than 10% on average NDCG@10. Furthermore, we propose several variants of PRP to improve efficiency and show that it is possible to achieve competitive results even with linear complexity.</span> <a class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis" href="https://research.google/pubs/large-language-models-are-effective-text-rankers-with-pairwise-ranking-prompting/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">View details</span> </a> </span> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </section> <section class="offset-two-up --theme-dark both" data-gt-id="offset_two_up" data-gt-component-name=""> <div class="glue-page glue-grid"> <div class="offset-two-up__left-col glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-4-sm glue-grid__col--span-12-md glue-grid__col--span-3-lg"> <h2 class="offset-two-up__headline headline-3">Some of our teams</h2> </div> <div class="glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-4-sm glue-grid__col--span-12-md glue-grid__col--span-9-lg"> <ul class="card-stack--small nested-glue-grid-override" data-gt-id="team_small_card_stack" data-gt-component-name="Team - Small Card Stack"> <li class="glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-6-md glue-grid__col--span-4-sm"> <a class="glue-card not-glue glue-card--small" href="/teams/athena/"> <div class="glue-card__inner"> <div class="glue-card__content"> <div class="content-wrapper"> <p class="glue-headline body js-gt-item-id"> Athena </p> </div> <div class="glue-card__cta glue-card__cta--arrow"> <span class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-button--icon"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#arrow-forward"></use> </svg> </span> </div> </div> </div> </a> </li> <li class="glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-6-md glue-grid__col--span-4-sm"> <a class="glue-card not-glue glue-card--small" href="/teams/graph-mining/"> <div class="glue-card__inner"> <div class="glue-card__content"> <div class="content-wrapper"> <p class="glue-headline body js-gt-item-id"> Graph mining </p> </div> <div class="glue-card__cta glue-card__cta--arrow"> <span class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-button--icon"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#arrow-forward"></use> </svg> </span> </div> </div> </div> </a> </li> <li class="glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-6-md glue-grid__col--span-4-sm"> <a class="glue-card not-glue glue-card--small" href="/teams/perception/"> <div class="glue-card__inner"> <div class="glue-card__content"> <div class="content-wrapper"> <p class="glue-headline body js-gt-item-id"> Perception </p> </div> <div class="glue-card__cta glue-card__cta--arrow"> <span class="glue-button glue-button--low-emphasis glue-button--icon"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon "> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#arrow-forward"></use> </svg> </span> </div> </div> </div> </a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> <section class="banner --theme-light" data-gt-id="banner" data-gt-component-name="None"> <div class="banner__wrapper glue-page glue-grid"> <div class="banner__copy glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-4-sm glue-grid__col--span-6-md"> <h2 class="banner__headline headline-3">Join us</h2> <p class="banner__body-copy body">We're always looking for more talented, passionate people.</p> <a class="glue-button glue-button--medium-emphasis" href="https://research.google/careers/" > <span class="js-gt-item-id">See opportunities</span> </a> </div> <div class="glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-0-sm glue-grid__col--span-1"></div> <div class="banner__image glue-grid__col glue-grid__col--span-4-sm glue-grid__col--span-5-md"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/gweb-research2023-media/images/Careers.original.jpg" alt="Careers" /> </div> </div> </section> </main> <footer class="glue-footer"> <div class="glue-page"> <section class="glue-social"> <div class="glue-social__group glue-social--monochrome"> <p class="glue-social__title glue-social__title--inline"> Follow us </p> <nav class="js-gt-follow-us-wrapper" aria-label="Social media links"> <ul class="glue-social__list" role="list"> <li class="glue-social__item"> <a class="glue-social__link" href="https://twitter.com/GoogleAI" title="Follow us on x" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-gt-method="x"" > <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--social glue-icon--24px"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/twitter-x.svg#twitter-x"></use> </svg> </a> </li> <li class="glue-social__item"> <a class="glue-social__link" href="https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/googleresearch/" title="Follow us on linkedin" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-gt-method="linkedin"" > <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--social glue-icon--24px"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#post-linkedin"></use> </svg> </a> </li> <li class="glue-social__item"> <a class="glue-social__link" href="https://www.youtube.com/c/GoogleResearch" title="Follow us on youtube" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-gt-method="youtube"" > <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--social glue-icon--24px"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#video-youtube"></use> </svg> </a> </li> <li class="glue-social__item"> <a class="glue-social__link" href="https://github.com/google-research" title="Follow us on github" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-gt-method="github"" > <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--social glue-icon--24px"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/github.svg#github"></use> </svg> </a> </li> </ul> </nav> </div> </section> </div> <div class="glue-fullbleed"></div> <section class="glue-page"> <nav class="glue-footer__global" aria-label="Footer resource links"> <div class="glue-footer__logo"> <a href="https://www.google.com" title="Google" class="glue-footer__link"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-footer__logo-img"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#google-solid-logo"></use> </svg> </a> </div> <ul class="glue-footer__global-links glue-no-bullet js-gt-global-nav-wrapper" role="list"> <li class="glue-footer__global-links-list-item" data-gt-primary="About Google"> <a class="glue-footer__link" href="https://about.google/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> About Google </a> </li> <li class="glue-footer__global-links-list-item" data-gt-primary="Google Products"> <a class="glue-footer__link" href="https://about.google/intl/en/products/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Google Products </a> </li> <li class="glue-footer__global-links-list-item" data-gt-primary="Privacy"> <a class="glue-footer__link" href="https://policies.google.com/privacy" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Privacy </a> </li> <li class="glue-footer__global-links-list-item" data-gt-primary="Terms"> <a class="glue-footer__link" href="https://policies.google.com/terms" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Terms </a> </li> </ul> <ul class="glue-footer__global-links glue-footer__global-links--extra glue-no-bullet" role="list"> <li class="glue-footer__global-links-list-item glue-footer__global-links-list-item--extra"> <a class="glue-footer__link" href="https://support.google.com/?hl=en"> <svg role="presentation" aria-hidden="true" aria-hidden="true" class="glue-icon glue-icon--24px glue-icon--footer-help"> <use href="/gr/static/assets/icons/glue-icons.svg#help"></use> </svg> Help </a> </li> <li class="glue-footer__global-links-list-item glue-footer__global-links-list-item--extra"> <button class="glue-footer__link google-feedback js-feedback-button" href="" data-product-id="5137383" > Submit feedback </button> </li> </ul> </nav> </section> </footer> <script src="https://www.gstatic.com/glue/v27_1/material-components-web.min.js"></script> <script src="https://www.youtube.com/player_api"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/gr/static/js/googleresearch.js?id=b70549917812130af912601ad763f13e"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="https://support.google.com/inapp/api.js"></script> <script src="https://www.gstatic.com/glue/cookienotificationbar/cookienotificationbar.min.js" data-glue-cookie-notification-bar-category="2B"> </script> </body> </html>