Debugging RAG: Why Your System Fails and How to Find the Real Problem

RAG failures often mask themselves as model degradation when the real culprits are stale data, poor retrieval, or inadequate chunking. This article introduces retrieval metrics—Context Precision, Context Recall, and Mean Reciprocal Rank—that pinpoint exactly which component is breaking. Mastering these diagnostics transforms RAG debugging from expensive model upgrades into targeted, cost-effective fixes.