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Stemming

Vangie Beal
Last Updated May 24, 2021 7:56 am

In search engine terminology, stemming is the comparison of a search engine query to the root form of a word used in the query. For example, a user may search for the term “cheaper,” but a search engine that uses stemming technology may return search results (SERP) for any word that contains the root form of the word (e.g. cheap, cheapen, cheaper).

Stemming may also be called word stemming.