- How does this work?
- descrybe has had servers working 24/7 since February 2023 reading judicial opinions and using AI to summarize and make them searchable. The generated opinion summaries in the search results are a way to quickly assess a case to see if it is relevant, drastically reducing your research time.
- What makes this different than other case search engines?
- descrybe.ai lets you use natural language to search, and it can find relevant cases without having to match exact words. For example, if you search for golf course, it will also search for cases related to country clubs. In addition, the summaries are in conversational English so anyone can read and understand them.
- How current are the opinions I can search?
- It depends on the court. Some courts make their opinions available right away while others do not. descrybe.ai includes the most recent opinions available. Check the Opinion Tracker to see the latest upload date for the court you are interested in searching.
- Why are you offering this for free?
- We believe that the democratization of information is crucial for a functioning society. Also, we know many solo practitioners, journalists, or others with an interest in legal research are currently priced out of the legal AI market. It is a part of our mission to help level the playing field.
- Is this related to ChatGPT?
- No. While we use a similar AI engine to ChatGPT to summarize complex legal documents, descrybe.ai does not use ChatGPT.
- What states can I search?
- Our database includes every available state appellate and supreme court judicial opinion in the United States since January 1, 1980.
- How current are the opinions I can search?
- It depends on the court. Some courts make their opinions available right away while others do not. descrybe.ai includes the most recent opinions available. Check the Opinion Tracker to see the latest upload date for the court you are interested in searching.
- Why don't you have federal all federal cases?
- We are close! All available federal district and appellate court cases will be loaded and searchable by mid-May 2024.
- Is this searching the internet?
- No, descrybe.ai is not searching the internet or making things up on the fly in response to requests. Our search engine doesn't know about anything other than the cases it has already summarized, and therefore it is unlikely to conflate cases together or "hallucinate" answers.
- Can I use these summaries in my own work?
- These summaries and the search results are for reference only to point you in the right direction for your research. While we are confident in the summaries, they have not been human verified, and you should not assume their accuracy without verifying against the original judicial opinions. Please see our Legal page for more information.
- I don't see a case I expect to see.
- Our data covers published cases with decision dates starting Jan 1, 1980 through current day, depending on the state. Further, only cases with written opinions are included.
- What do you track?
- We only track what is necessary to make the tool work. Specifically: We have Google Analytics so we can see general website traffic, but there's nothing to individually identify you; We don't have any Facebook, Twitter, or other 3rd party tracking code on our website.