How do you update a vector index when source documents change?

How do you update a vector index when source documents change?hard

Type: conceptual
Topic: do-you-update-a-vector-index-when-source-documents-change
Frequency: common
Tags: rag, how, you, update, vector, index

Answer

(1) Delete + re-insert: delete old vectors by doc ID, re-embed and insert updated chunks.

Explanation

(1) Delete + re-insert: delete old vectors by doc ID, re-embed and insert updated chunks. (2) Versioning: add version field to metadata, filter to latest. (3) Incremental indexing: only process changed docs (track last-modified timestamps in S3). (4) Scheduled full reindex for major structural changes. For real-time: S3 → EventBridge → Lambda → vector DB pipeline.

Follow-upCan you give a production example?