Need to Clear Cache Before Searching for Subtitles??

[viking]

I tried to download subtitles for a show right after its release and several days following. However, no subtitles were found using hash match (and name search resulted in the 409 error that I often get).

I then cleared the cache: "filebot -clear-cache" and subtitles were then found by hash!

Is it necessary to clear the cache before searching for subtitles?
What is the purpose of the cache?

[rednoah]

Caching reduces load on OpenSubtitles if you repeatedly send the same search requests. Data is cached for a maximum of 48 hours, so waiting 48 hours is equivalent to clearing the cache.

So if you continuously search for subtitles, you can only get new results every 2 days. And if you only perform one search every 2 days you will always get new results.