Giving a retrieval assistant more text does not automatically give it better evidence for the question.

Long context can contain duplicate passages, irrelevant details, and extra review work. Plan the information needed before expanding the token budget.

Inspect a sample of resolved questions and the evidence used. Look for repeated chunks and material that did not help the decision.

Separate ingestion costs from query costs, and include latency, review time, and unresolved cases when comparing changes.

Set an operating envelope that the team can maintain. Optimize cost per resolved question, rather than celebrating a cheap model call that leaves the work unfinished.

Original article explainer. AI-assisted conceptual illustration and neural narration; original synthesized music. Not a human recording or customer result.