GraphRAG: The Definitive Guide

Chapter 7. Knowledge Graph Construction

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This will be the 7th chapter of the final book. Please note that the GitHub repo will be made active later on.

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In chapter 4 we established that a knowledge graph is a logical construct first, and only then an implementation. That distinction is not just terminological or academic. It determines whether your knowledge graph becomes a purposeful part of the retrieval architecture, or just an artefact you produce because “GraphRAG seems to demand it”. The graph is only valuable to the extent that it improves RAG.

This chapter is about construction, but not in the traditional “how to load data into Neo4j” sense. It’s about the kinds of construction choices that make GraphRAG systems behave in a predictable, explainable and governable way. In every case, you need to build the right graph for the system you’re building, in this one specifically, this means the structures in the KG will match the retrieval strategies you plan to use in it.

Sometimes that means loading business entities and relationships into the graph (closer to traditional graph construction). Sometimes ...