Why RefChat?
Six pillars that set it apart from a generic RAG or a ChatGPT-dressed-as-PDF-search.
Absolute confidentiality
Your documents never leave your machine in local mode. Cloud mode available if you'd rather offload the heavy lifting to our European servers.
Precise hybrid search
Multilingual semantic search (E5-large), BM25 keyword, and cross-encoder reranking. More accurate than a basic RAG, with sources cited explicitly.
5 smart modes
RefChat automatically detects what you want: question, summary, references list, author search, fact-check.
Advanced OCR & parsing
Scanned PDFs? Old image-only reports? EasyOCR + GROBID extract text, metadata and scientific structure.
Automatic topics
BERTopic clustering organises your library into coherent themes. Rename, merge or split them to fit your mental model.
Multilingual by design
Ask a question in English about a French article (or the other way around) — RefChat finds the relevant content regardless of language.
5 query modes detected automatically
You write your question in natural language — RefChat infers what you actually want.
| Mode | Trigger | Behaviour |
|---|---|---|
| Question | (default) | Narrative answer with sourced citations |
| Summary | "summarise", "synthesis" | Synthesis of one or several articles |
| References | "which publications" | List of relevant articles with explanations |
| Author | "articles by", "works by" | Author search via OpenAlex |
| Fact-check | "check", "is it true that" | Verifies claims against your bibliography |
RefChat in pictures
A glimpse at the interface — from sourced chat to thematic exploration of your library.
Sourced conversation
Every answer cites the exact passages of the underlying articles, with direct links to the PDF.
Thematic mapping
Visualise the main axes of your library, automatically grouped by topic.
Transparent indexing
Detailed progress of GROBID parsing, OCR, embeddings and topic modelling.
Who is it for?
Built for demanding environments where confidentiality and rigour come first.
🔬 R&D and academic research
State-of-the-art synthesis, cross-referencing hundreds of articles. Accelerate your literature reviews.
📊 Technology watch
Sector reports, patents, publications. Ask strategic questions with zero risk of leak.
📚 Industrial knowledge mining
Surface the information buried in decades of internal reports (OCR + RAG).
🏛️ Consultancies and expertise
Ideal for organisations handling sensitive documents (legal, medical, geoscience).
Try it on your own library
30-minute live demo, or a trial run on a sample of your PDFs, under NDA if needed.
Request a demo