System and method for estimating query performance in document retrieval

A computer implemented method for estimating quality of document retrieval comprising: retrieving from a corpus of documents stored on at least one storage a plurality of digital documents which comply with a document retrieval query according to a retrieval model; computing a plurality of retrieval scores each calculated for one of the plurality of digital documents using a relevance function scoring a relevance of one of the retrieved plurality of digital documents to the query; computing a calibrated weighted product model (WPM) estimator by calculating a combination of the plurality of retrieval scores weighted according to a plurality of retrieval features of the corpus and/or the query and/or a document, wherein the plurality of retrieval features are weighted according to a relative importance; and using the calibrated WPM estimator to score the plurality of digital documents' relevance to the query.