Retrieval instructions for Amazon Bedrock agentic retrieval: Agentic retrieval on fully managed Amazon Bedrock knowledge bases now supports retrieval instructions. A retrieval instruction steers how the agent searches your knowledge bases and how it answer

Create and Manage Retrieval Instructions

A retrieval instruction is a reusable resource that steers agentic retrieval. It sets how the agent searches your knowledge bases, who the assistant is, how the assistant formats answers, and when it declines to answer. You write the instruction once, Amazon Bedrock reviews it, and then you reference it from AgenticRetrieveStream requests.

How Retrieval Instructions Work

A retrieval instruction has four fields. Set at least one. Write each field as instructions addressed to the assistant, and put each kind of guidance in the field that controls it.

• retrievalGuidance: How the agent interprets and decomposes the question, and what it prioritizes when it searches.
• persona: Who the assistant is, including its identity, tone, and language.
• answerFormat: How the answer is structured, including how it cites sources.
• answerPolicy: Whether and how to answer. For example, how strongly the retrieved results must support an answer, and what to do with questions that are out of scope.

What to do

• Create a retrieval instruction by sending a CreateRetrievalInstruction request with a name and an instruction.
• Apply a retrieval instruction to an AgenticRetrieveStream request to check which version a request used.
• Update a retrieval instruction by sending an UpdateRetrievalInstruction request. An update replaces the whole instruction, so send every field that you want to keep.
• Create and manage versions to roll out changes without affecting applications that use pinned versions.
• Delete a retrieval instruction or a version by calling DeleteRetrievalInstruction.

Source: AWS release notes

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