What is a knowledge cutoff?
A knowledge cutoff is the point after which a model was not trained on newer public information. It can sound current and still miss a change that happened later. Vendors publish the date in their own docs, and it differs by model.
Also called: training cutoff
In plain English
The model learned from a pile that stops. Your prices, a new street rule, a product that launched last month: those are not in that pile unless you paste them or the tool looks them up. A cutoff is not the same as a stale file in your folder. One is the model's schooling. The other is your document. Treat the cutoff as a reason to attach the current fact, not as a trivia question. The model can be fluent about your trade and wrong about this month's rule, price, or holiday. When the job depends on something that changed, paste the current line or turn on a source you trust. Do not ask it to 'just know.'
How an owner would use it
For anything time-sensitive, paste the current fact or use a tool that retrieves a source you can open. Do not ask 'what is the latest' and accept a year. Check the vendor's model page if you need their stated cutoff. Do not guess it.
Common mistakes
Asking a model for 'the current law' or 'this season's code' without a source is how a confident paragraph gets into a quote. Memory and a long chat do not move the cutoff. Web search might, if you open the page. Do not store the model's answer back into the SOP as if it were the manufacturer.
A worked example
A locksmith
The keyway chart comes from the truck, not the chat
This is an illustration, not a customer result. A new hire asks the chat which blank fits a lock they have not seen. The owner treats that answer as a maybe. The fit is confirmed from the manufacturer's current chart in the shop binder. The chat is used only to turn the tech's notes into a customer text after the blank is known.
Related terms
Prompts and guides
Questions owners ask
What is a knowledge cutoff?
It is the horizon of a model's training. Events and documents after that point are not in its built-in knowledge unless you provide them or a tool retrieves them.
How should an owner work around a cutoff?
Paste the current policy, price, or spec, or point the tool at a page you trust and read that page. Do not let the draft be the update.
If I upload a new file, did I move the cutoff?
You gave the tool a document to read. You did not retrain the model. Delete the file and that document knowledge should go away. The model's general schooling stays where the vendor left it.
Product guides are on AI apps for business.