Understanding result relevance

Result scoring

Search results are ordered by relevance. Contradic looks at both the exact words you typed and the overall meaning of your query, then places the strongest matches at the top.

If you see highlighted terms in a result, that’s where your keywords appear in the document preview.

Learn how search works

Number of returned results

The results list focuses on the strongest matches. This keeps the list useful even when the query is broad.

You might see fewer results when:

• Your query is very specific or uses uncommon terms.
• Filters narrow the search to a smaller set of documents.
• The strongest matches are concentrated in a few documents.

Refinement tips

Use these quick adjustments to improve relevance:

• Add one or two precise terms that appear in the document, such as a project name or clause title.
• Use filters to narrow by Document type, Tags, File extension, or Filename.
• If your list is too short, remove a filter or try a broader term.

For filename filters, you can use * as a wildcard. For example, invoice* finds files that start with “invoice,” and *summary* finds names that contain “summary.”

Need more help with filters? See Filters & sorting.