An information retrieval system for search a corpus is configured to, for each of a plurality of searches of at least a subset of the corpus, generate a confidence score for each of a plurality of putative occurrences of a search query in the at least a subset of the corpus. The system is further configured to adjust a threshold to maintain a consistent user experience across the plurality of searches according to a consistency criterion. The system is further configured to display putative occurrences of the search query having a confidence score greater than the threshold.