What is Knowledge Base (AI)?
A collection of documents indexed for retrieval by an AI agent to answer questions accurately.
Definition
In the context of AI systems, a knowledge base is a structured collection of documents, articles, or data that has been indexed (typically using embeddings) for retrieval by an AI agent or RAG system. When a user asks a question, the AI retrieves the most relevant content from the knowledge base and uses it to generate a grounded, accurate answer — rather than relying on general training data that may be outdated or wrong.
Example
A company builds an AI knowledge base from their Notion wiki and Google Drive. When employees ask 'what's our PTO policy?' in Slack, the AI retrieves the relevant policy document and answers accurately — citing the source.
Knowledge Base (AI) vs rag: What's the difference?
A collection of documents indexed for retrieval by an AI agent to answer questions accurately.
The knowledge base is the collection of documents. RAG is the technique that retrieves from it and generates answers using the retrieved content.