Federal Case Law Search: Find Federal Court Opinions and Circuit Precedent
Ask your federal question in plain English and get on-point decisions from the district courts, the circuits, and the Supreme Court, each with the holding surfaced and a real citation you can check.
How courts have ruled
Sample results, illustrative only. Informational research, not legal advice. Verify every citation.
In short
Federal case law is public record and the opinions are free. Written decisions from federal appellate, district, and bankruptcy courts are published on govinfo by the Government Publishing Office, CourtListener carries a very large free collection including the RECAP archive of PACER filings, and PACER itself charges 0.10 dollars per page capped at 3.00 dollars per document, with fees waived if you spend 30 dollars or less in a quarter and with court opinions always free. What the free sources do not give you is a citator or an issue-based search: they are organized around documents, so you have to already know what you are looking for. Cases takes the legal question in plain English and returns on-point federal and state precedent as headnote cards with a real citation, for a published 29 dollars per month. This is informational research, not legal advice, and you should always validate a citation before you rely on it.
Last updated July 2026
Where federal decisions actually live
Federal case law search: every source compared
There is no single database of federal case law. The decisions are spread across official government sites, a nonprofit archive, the courts themselves, and the commercial platforms, and each covers a different slice at a different price. Here is the honest map, including where we fall short.
| Source | What it covers | Cost | Citator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cases | US federal and state opinions, searched by a plain-English question | 29 dollars per month, published | No |
| govinfo (GPO) | Written opinions from federal appellate, district, and bankruptcy courts | Free, no account | No |
| CourtListener | Millions of federal and state opinions, plus the RECAP archive of PACER documents | Free, nonprofit | Citation lookup, not full treatment analysis |
| PACER | Dockets and filings from federal appellate, district, and bankruptcy courts | 0.10 dollars per page, capped at 3 dollars per document; opinions always free | No |
| Google Scholar | Federal and state opinions with basic citing-reference lists | Free | No |
| Fastcase or vLex via your state bar | Federal and state case law | Often included in bar dues | Authority Check |
| Westlaw or LexisNexis | Federal and state primary law with editorial headnotes | Subscription, largely quote-based | KeyCite or Shepard's |
PACER fees are quoted from the official PACER pricing guidance as of July 2026. Free-source coverage varies by court and by year, and district courts do not designate every decision for publication.
Know which court binds you
How the federal courts are organized, and why it changes your search
Federal cases start in one of 94 judicial districts. Appeals go to one of 13 courts of appeals: the 12 regional circuits, plus the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which takes subject-matter appeals such as patent cases. Above all of them sits the Supreme Court of the United States.
That hierarchy decides what your search is worth. A published decision from your own circuit binds the district courts inside it. A decision from a different circuit does not, no matter how well reasoned, and citing one as though it controls is a fast way to lose credibility with a judge. District court decisions do not bind other district judges at all, even in the same district. So the first filter in any federal case law search is not the keyword, it is the court.
The same logic runs the other way for state courts. They are bound by the Supreme Court on federal questions but not by the lower federal courts, which is a distinction that trips up a lot of briefs. We cover it properly in state vs federal case law and in binding vs persuasive precedent. For state-level research, start at our state case law search hub.
A workflow that holds up
How to run a federal case law search in four steps
1. Fix the jurisdiction first
Decide which court you are writing for before you search anything. That tells you which circuit is binding, which is merely persuasive, and whether you need district-level decisions at all. Searching before you answer this produces a pile of cases you cannot use.
2. Search the issue, not the case name
If you already know the case, any free database will find it. The hard search is the one where you know the legal problem and not the authority. Describe the issue in plain English and let the search return on-point decisions with the holding surfaced, then read the ones that actually match your facts.
3. Read the opinion, not the summary
Summaries, including ours, are a way to triage. They are not a substitute for reading the decision. Pull the full text from govinfo, CourtListener, or the court site, and confirm the holding says what the summary says it says. AI tools have put fabricated citations in real briefs, and reading the case is the check that catches it.
4. Validate before you cite
Run every citation through a citator to confirm it has not been reversed, overruled, or seriously criticized. This is the step the free sources do not cover, and it is not optional. If you do not have Westlaw or Lexis, check whether your state bar includes Fastcase or vLex with Authority Check.
Honest scope
Where Cases helps with federal research, and where it does not
Cases does the finding half. You ask a federal question the way you would ask a colleague, and you get back on-point US federal and state precedents as headnote cards, each with a summary, the holding, and a real citation. Pricing is published at 29 dollars per month, so there is no quote and no sales call.
We are not a citator, and we say so on every page that touches the subject. We do not tell you whether a case has been overruled, and no responsible research workflow skips that check. Our citator comparison covers every option, including the ones that are free with a bar membership you may already hold. We are also not a docket service: for filings and case histories, PACER and its free RECAP mirror remain the answer.
If you are weighing the paid platforms for federal work, our comparisons of Westlaw legal research and LexisNexis legal research lay out what each tier includes and what it costs. For appeals specifically, see appellate court case search.
Questions researchers ask
Federal case law search, answered
How do I search federal case law?
Start with the free official sources and escalate only if you need more. Written opinions from federal appellate, district, and bankruptcy courts are published on govinfo by the Government Publishing Office, and you can browse or search them by court, date, or keyword with no account. CourtListener carries a very large collection of federal and state decisions. If you need the docket and the filings rather than the decision, that is PACER. A paid platform earns its price mainly when you need a citator.
Is federal case law free to search?
Yes, the opinions themselves are free. Federal court decisions are public record, and govinfo, CourtListener, and Google Scholar all carry them at no charge. PACER charges for docket and filing pages, at 0.10 dollars per page capped at 3.00 dollars per document, but the official PACER guidance states that court opinions are always free, and fees are waived entirely if you spend 30 dollars or less in a quarter. What costs money is not the law, it is the tooling around it: the citator, the headnotes, and the search.
What is the difference between PACER and CourtListener?
PACER is the federal judiciary's official system for case dockets and filed documents, and it charges per page. CourtListener is a free nonprofit legal research site that carries published opinions and, through its RECAP archive, a large set of documents that users have already pulled from PACER. In practice you use CourtListener first to read the decision at no cost, and go to PACER when you need something from the docket that nobody has uploaded yet.
How many federal courts are there?
The federal judiciary is a three-level system. Trial cases are heard in 94 federal judicial districts, appeals go to 13 courts of appeals (12 regional circuits plus the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit), and the Supreme Court of the United States sits at the top. This structure is what makes jurisdiction the first question in any federal case law search, because a decision from another circuit is persuasive rather than binding on your court.
Is federal case law binding on state courts?
Only in part. State courts are bound by the Supreme Court of the United States on questions of federal law, including the federal constitution. They are not bound by the lower federal courts, so a decision from a federal district court or a court of appeals is persuasive authority in a state court, not controlling. On questions of state law, the state's own highest court has the final word, and federal courts follow it.
How do I know if a federal case is still good law?
You check it in a citator, and that is the one job the free sources do not really do. A citator reports how later courts treated the decision, so you can see if it was reversed, overruled, or criticized before you rely on it. KeyCite on Westlaw and Shepard's on LexisNexis are the two incumbents, and many state bars include Fastcase or vLex with its Authority Check citator in your dues. Never cite a case you have not validated.
Where can I find federal district court opinions?
Written district court opinions are posted on govinfo, on the individual court websites, and in CourtListener's collection. Coverage varies by court and by year, and district courts do not publish everything, which is the main limitation of the free sources. If you need an opinion that was issued but never designated for publication, PACER is where it lives, and unpublished opinions are also carried by the commercial platforms.
What is the fastest way to find federal precedent on a legal issue?
Search by the legal question rather than by case name. Free databases are organized around documents, so if you do not already know which case you want, you spend the time on keyword guessing. Describing the issue in plain English and getting back on-point decisions with the holding surfaced skips that step. Cases does exactly that for federal and state precedent, then gives you a real citation you can validate in whichever citator you have access to.
Keep researching
Find the federal precedent you need
Ask your question in plain English and get on-point federal and state decisions with a real citation. Published pricing from 29 dollars per month, no sales call. Informational research, not legal advice, always verify the citation.