Top Free Platforms for Court Cases

The AI Lawsuit Database is built entirely from public court records. Every platform below is free, and together they cover federal dockets, state courts, and judicial opinions nationwide. These are the sources we work from, and they are the same sources you can use to verify any case on this site yourself.

1. CourtListener and the RECAP Archive

Best for: Federal and state dockets, full text opinions, and downloadable filings.

How it works: Maintained by the non-profit Free Law Project, CourtListener hosts hundreds of millions of case records, opinions, and audio recordings of oral arguments.

The RECAP advantage: Official federal court filings are housed on PACER, which usually charges $0.10 per page. CourtListener's browser extension, RECAP, automatically uploads any documents purchased or retrieved by its massive network of users into a public, 100% free searchable archive.

2. Google Scholar (Case Law)

Best for: Searching judicial opinions across state supreme and appellate courts and federal courts.

How it works: Go to Google Scholar and select the "Case law" radio button under the search bar. You can filter searches by specific state or federal jurisdictions to read full court opinions and see which subsequent cases cited those opinions.

3. JudyRecords

Best for: Searching nationwide lawsuit filings and party names.

How it works: JudyRecords is a free nationwide search engine covering over 700 million state and federal court records. It excels at cross-referencing names or business entities across various jurisdictions without requiring an account.

4. Justia and FindLaw

Best for: User-friendly summaries of major state and federal court opinions, organized by legal topic or court level.

How it works: Both sites maintain comprehensive databases of historic and recent court decisions, making it easy to look up cases by party name, volume number, or keyword.

5. Official State and County Court Portals

Best for: Local criminal, civil, family, or traffic court records.

How it works: Most county clerk of court websites offer a public search portal, often called Smart Search, Odyssey Portal, or Public Access Inquiry. These local portals allow you to search local court dockets, hearing dates, and case statuses for free.

Free access options for federal records (PACER)

If you need official filings from PACER, the federal courts' Public Access to Court Electronic Records system:

• The $30 per quarter rule: PACER charges $0.10 per page viewed. However, if your bill is $30 or less in a calendar quarter, the fee is completely waived, effectively making light research free.
• Court opinions: Written judge opinions on PACER are always 100% free to download.
• Courthouse public terminals: Visiting any federal courthouse library or clerk's office allows you to search and view PACER documents for free on their public access terminals.

How the database uses these sources

Each case in the AI Lawsuit Database is anchored to its CourtListener docket. A nightly sync pulls new docket entries, updates case statuses, and watches for newly filed AI lawsuits across the RECAP Archive. Nothing is published from a news article alone: statuses and timeline entries come from the docket itself, and every case page links to the full public filings so you can read the source directly.