{
  "definition": "A neural architecture that jointly processes both sides of a matching problem, such as a query and a document, allowing direct interaction between them before producing a relevance, similarity, or classification score.",
  "id": "cross-encoder",
  "kind": "Method",
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/",
  "links": [
    {
      "label": "Sentence Transformers CrossEncoder documentation",
      "type": "officialHomepage",
      "url": "https://www.sbert.net/"
    }
  ],
  "modifiedAt": "2026-09-12T22:23:29Z",
  "prefLabel": "Cross-Encoder",
  "publisher": {
    "name": "Searchplex",
    "url": "https://searchplex.net/"
  },
  "relations": [
    {
      "note": "Cross-encoders process a pair jointly; dual encoders encode each side independently and compare representations.",
      "target": "dual-encoder",
      "type": "notEquivalentTo"
    },
    {
      "note": "Cross-Encoder names a model architecture or method; ranking is the task of ordering results.",
      "target": "ranking",
      "type": "notEquivalentTo"
    },
    {
      "note": "A Cross-Encoder is one common way to perform reranking, but reranking is the retrieval-system task or stage.",
      "target": "reranking",
      "type": "notEquivalentTo"
    },
    {
      "target": "dual-encoder",
      "type": "related"
    },
    {
      "target": "multi-stage-ranking",
      "type": "related"
    },
    {
      "target": "retrieve-and-rerank",
      "type": "related"
    },
    {
      "target": "ranking",
      "type": "usedFor"
    },
    {
      "target": "reranking",
      "type": "usedFor"
    }
  ],
  "representations": {
    "html": "https://id.searchplex.net/cross-encoder/",
    "json": "https://id.searchplex.net/cross-encoder.json",
    "jsonld": "https://id.searchplex.net/cross-encoder.jsonld"
  },
  "scheme": "https://id.searchplex.net/scheme/",
  "scopeNote": "Because each query-candidate pair must be processed jointly, Cross-Encoders are usually much more expensive for large-scale retrieval than independently encoded representations. In search systems they are therefore commonly used to rerank a bounded candidate set.",
  "status": "published",
  "terms": [
    {
      "community": "industry",
      "label": "Reranker",
      "usage": "nearSynonym"
    }
  ],
  "uri": "https://id.searchplex.net/cross-encoder/"
}