---
title: "What is Grounding? - LeapScope"
url: https://leap-scope.com/glossary/grounding
description: "Grounding is when an AI engine retrieves current documents, usually with a web search, and writes its answer from them, citing them as sources."
---

# Grounding (retrieval-augmented generation)

Grounding is when an AI engine retrieves current documents, usually with a web search, and writes its answer from them, citing them as sources.

Without grounding, a model answers from its training data and cannot cite anything; brand mentions then depend on what the model learned months earlier. With grounding, the answer depends on which pages the search retrieves today, which is what a website can influence.

ChatGPT with search, Perplexity, Gemini with Google Search and AI Overviews are all grounded surfaces. That is why AI visibility tracking focuses on them: the loop between publishing a page and being cited closes in days, not training cycles.

## Related terms

- [Citation (in an AI answer)](https://leap-scope.com/glossary/citation)
- [Query fan-out](https://leap-scope.com/glossary/query-fan-out)
- [AI crawler](https://leap-scope.com/glossary/ai-crawler)

[All glossary terms](https://leap-scope.com/glossary)

## Measure grounding (retrieval-augmented generation) for your brand

LeapScope tracks the prompts your buyers ask on the AI engines every day and reports mentions, citations and share of voice against your competitors.