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CourtListener

A free legal research website containing millions of legal opinions from federal and state courts.

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Overview

CourtListener is a flagship project of the Free Law Project, a non-profit organization dedicated to providing free, public access to primary legal materials. It offers a vast, searchable database of court opinions, dockets (via the RECAP project), oral arguments, and judicial data, serving as a critical resource for researchers, journalists, smaller law firms, and the public.

✨ Key Features

  • Free access to millions of court opinions
  • Searchable database of federal and state cases
  • RECAP Archive of PACER documents
  • Oral argument audio library
  • Alerts for new opinions and filings
  • APIs for data access

🎯 Key Differentiators

  • Completely free and open access model.
  • Non-profit mission focused on public access to law.
  • The RECAP project, which crowdsources a free alternative to PACER.

Unique Value: Democratizes access to the law by providing a comprehensive, searchable database of primary legal materials for free.

🎯 Use Cases (4)

Free legal research Academic and journalistic research Tracking federal litigation Accessing historical court records

✅ Best For

  • Finding a specific federal court opinion for free
  • Setting up an alert for new decisions from the Supreme Court

💡 Check With Vendor

Verify these considerations match your specific requirements:

  • Users needing sophisticated, predictive analytics on judicial behavior.
  • Users requiring guaranteed, comprehensive state court docket coverage.

🏆 Alternatives

Google Scholar Casetext Fastcase

Offers a robust, free alternative to expensive commercial legal research platforms, with a unique crowdsourced docket collection.

💻 Platforms

Web API

🔌 Integrations

RECAP Browser Extension

🛟 Support Options

  • ✓ Email Support

💰 Pricing

Contact for pricing
Free Tier Available

Free tier: None for core features; donations encouraged.

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